


Ouroboros

by frangipani



Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Thrawn Trilogy - Timothy Zahn
Genre: AU of an AU, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Collateral Damage, Dark, Explosions, F/M, Lightsabers, Mysticism, Rule of Cool, Self Harm, Sith, Time Travel, action adventure, antihero, being an emperor's minion sucks, deus ex machinas, luke skywalker's implacable goodness, mara is my woobie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-23
Packaged: 2018-08-12 16:25:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 23,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7941283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frangipani/pseuds/frangipani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I made a mistake,” she said. “I want to correct it.”</p><p>Timeline is first half of RotJ<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> What's fanfic without a [pretentious title](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros)?
> 
> Warning for a slightly different approach to shipping.

****

**4 ABY**

Luke Skywalker stood under the blazing Tatooine sun, squinting at the enormous sail barge before him. A cheer had gone up when Jabba had given the order to toss him in the sarlacc pit, but he only dimly registered it. Luke saluted as the signal to Artoo and jumped off the plank. There were more cheers, but he didn’t hear those either as he grasped the end of the plank. He let it catapult him up, flipping in midair to land in the middle of the skiff, hand outstretched to receive the lightsaber as it curved down towards him. 

To his shock, instead of continuing its descent towards him, it suddenly changed direction, going the opposite side -- to the hand of a slender figure at the top of the barge. Another Force user? The suns behind the vessel made it difficult to make out details, but he knew it to be a woman...and she was laughing derisively…

Luke’s stomach sank, but he summoned focus over it. Using the distraction from his escape, he flew into action, kicking the guard away from him and reaching to grasp his vibro ax as he fell. Luke pulled it from the guard’s grip, and sent the next closest guard to him tumbling down the skiff with a swipe of the ax. The first guard came back up and he launched him over the edge of the skiff with a Force- bolstered kick as he thrust the end of the ax into another approaching guard. It was not quite as easy or clean as it would have been with his lightsaber to dispatch the remaining two guards that came at him next, the helmsman being taken care of by Lando, but Luke threw all his will to it -- his friends’ lives were hanging in the balance. It was when he saw the bounty hunter fly into the skiff that concern filtered in. The bounty hunter took aim, and Luke’s senses told him to duck, the shot missing him by inches. The bounty hunter readied for another shot--

A powerful burst threw the bounty hunter clean off the skiff and into the sarlacc pit. Luke raised his head to see a figure in a thick cowl and goggles align a speeder bike along the skiff one handed, a powerful looking blaster pistol in the other hand.

He didn’t have time to give his thanks before the pistol was pointed at him.

“You’re leaving this party,” a female voice said.

He was about to object when his danger sense tingled. He jumped back just as several shots rang out from Jabba’s sail barge, making the skiff shake on impact. 

Off the corner of his eye Luke noted that the speeder bike had pulled back. Whoever that was, she didn't seem as inclined as Jabba's henchmen to shoot him, so Luke kept to the plan. Another skiff came up blasting and he called on the Force to jump on it. The woman in the speeder behind him picked off the first two shooters and the helmsman in the back in quick succession while Luke threw himself into a crouching spin, missing the first volley of shots, and sending his attackers sprawling. One, he took out with the ax, the other he got on his way up, using the Force behind his swing to send him out of the skiff and down to the pit. 

Luke skittered out of the way as the remaining guard took a shot, but another blast rang out just over Luke’s shoulder, throwing the guard over the rail of the skiff.

The woman was back beside the skiff in her speeder. She shot scarcely a few inches from his feet just in the direction he’d meant to run to jump into Jabba’s sail barge. “Now, Skywalker!” she growled. 

“I’m not done here!” he yelled back. 

She cursed and he saw her hit a switch on the speeder, before reaching out for something in her waist and turning towards the sail barge. 

Thermal detonator! The air left his lungs in a rush -- _Leia_ \-- he screamed “No!” throwing up a hand. The detonator stopped in midair just at the tip of the skiff and went off, shaking the small vessel violently enough to launch him off, his ears still ringing. Luke managed to get a hold on the side, suddenly looking down at the fetid mouth on the sand below. The bike whirred stridently as it changed directions, the woman cursing viciously. 

Shots made the skiff shake hard enough to almost dislodge him. Luke drew on the Force to keep his hold. Shifting his gaze to the sail barge across from his skiff, he saw that the woman who had taken his lightsaber had pointed one of the sail barge’s deck guns in his skiff’s direction. He couldn’t see much other than the red gold color of her hair. She let out another volley of shots and the skiff shook again. 

“Concussion grenade! Wouldn't have done much but startle them, hero!” the woman in the speeder shouted at him, emphasizing the last like an insult. But she extended a hand. “Get on!”

His choices limited at the moment, Luke took her arm and swung himself behind her. He would probe her through the Force, but she was shoving her pistol at him as she switched off the bike's autopilot. He held on to the woman's waist with one hand as he took several shots towards the sail barge with the other. Calling on the Force for a stable hold, he returned fire to one guard emerging from the side flaps and another with a blaster on the top deck. He tightened his hold on the woman's waist as she threw the bike into a jerky evasive pattern. In all the tumult the redhaired woman had disappeared.

Luke threw a quick look over to where Han and Chewie were. Lando had managed to take control of the skiff and was piloting it towards the barge.

In front of him, the woman reached for her pouch one handed and pulled out another concussion grenade, throwing it to Jabba’s sail barge. Luke felt as she armed and nudged it with the Force and his mouth fell open. _Another_ Force user? 

Although the blast threw the sail barge guards on the top deck down, and Luke breathed a sigh of relief when Leia emerged, blaster in hand, only a few seconds later. Several guards were behind her, mostly Gamorreans. Luke drew from the Force and took them out one by one, clearing it for her to swing herself off and jump into Lando’s skiff. Beyond them, Luke saw the droids drop off the barge to the sand below. He smiled as Leia almost threw Han down with her sudden hug once she was on the skiff. Calm settled on him even as the bike continued ducking and swerving, narrowly missing the many blaster bolts whizzing by. 

His danger sense spiked again and he saw another skiff rushing towards them, the woman with red gold hair at the helm. He jerked to the side, feeling the heat of the bolt that flew by his temple.

The woman in front of him cursed and slammed the throttle and Luke only had the briefest second of warning before the acceleration threw him hard against her back, he wrapped his arms around her waist and held on, barely aware he’d lost the blaster pistol.

“My blaster!” she snapped as she wove through the bolts. 

“Sorry!” Luke yelled over the sound of blaster fire.

Luckily the bike had more speed and it quickly gathered distance from the skiff. To his surprise, instead of leaving the skiff and the sail barge behind to follow Han and Leia, the woman looped around tightly to get behind the barge.

“What are you--”

“Quiet!” She was pulling something out and this time he was sure that was a thermal detonator. He watched as it flew towards the sail barge, the woman angling it and arming it as it approached the ship. She hit the throttle again, just before it went off, but Luke had to look back, had to see all of Jabba’s sordidness, all his slaving and plundering go up in flames. The explosion and its debris took the redhead, already well behind them, off course. Soon the wreckage was just another speck in the distance, Luke closed his eyes. He'd lost his lightsaber, but they had gotten Han out. It was over.

All that preparation, all that anguish had been worth it. He could always build another lightsaber.

Luke's attention shifted to the woman before him. "Thank--"

"Save it." 

Luke thought to her weaponry, her skill with the speeder and as a shot. Bounty hunter? With some Force ability? Someone with a grudge against Jabba? But she'd been after him.

“I’m to meet my friends at Mos Eisley,” he said. “If credits are what you want, they can reward you handsomely.” 

This woman laughed gratingly, but didn’t answer.

“Who are you?”

She didn’t answer then either.

Luke sighed and concentrated, drawing on the Force intending to bring the bike to a stop. Then it was as if a scythe had whipped through his concentration. 

“Don’t do that,” the woman warned flatly. “You can either be conscious by the time we get to where we’re going --”

He tried to use the Force to stop the speeder again. She couldn’t possibly-- and he felt a sudden constriction at his throat. And there he did feel the clammy feeling that indicated that she was using the dark side. Not just any Force user then. Panic rose up inside him. She couldn't be...he drew calm to himself. 

“Or I can drag you around like cargo. It’s up to you,” she finished. 

Luke stretched to the Force. The invisible hand at his throat tightened. He ignored it, hadn’t Yoda said--

The grip shifted right over his carotid artery and suddenly there was no _do or do not_ , just darkness.

\--

Luke woke up in a bunk. The whir of engines told him he was in a ship. A moving ship. The cabin was small, not much different than the _Falcon's_. Probably a freighter then.

Blinking off the disorientation, he half expected to find some sort of restraining device, but he was free. Thinking back to what got him here, the Force user, the _other one_ , he reached with the Force…

A sudden chill made its way up his limbs, he felt dragged down into a morass of hate and despair --

The feeling cut off. He blinked. What had _that_ been?

He sat up. The woman hadn’t restrained him, he thought with growing trepidation, because she was sure he could do nothing to get away. Was she an Imperial agent? 

Had Vader sent her?

Luke went towards the cockpit, the reddish brown form of Tatooine loomed large in the viewport, but no one sat in the pilot's seat. A quick scan of the instruments revealed the ship -- a Suwantek TL-1800 light freighter --had been set in orbit around the planet on autopilot. Luke went through a doorway that lead to a galley. No one was there either and he felt a shiver creep up his spine. He should be able to sense the woman.

Luke went past the galley and into a small the lounge area and there she was at a table, her back to him as she sat working on some electronics. She had a slender frame, but the exposed skin of of her arms through the sleeveless tunic she wore was densely muscled and heavily scarred, everything from thick deep scars, to burn marks, to shallower scars that looked drawn on her skin like spindly trees. The scars littered not just her arms, but her shoulders and even her neck, everywhere, it seemed. Her hair was cropped close to the skull in a buzz cut, auburn by the looks of it, but the cut was too close to tell the exact shade. 

“Finally awake, are you?” she asked, not looking up from her work.

“Who are you?” 

“No one.” She finally seemed to be done with whatever it was. Luke cautiously stepped forward and gasped in spite of himself.

It was a lightsaber.

There was a brief pang as he remembered his lost lightsaber. His own and he'd _just_ constructed it -- but another thought took precedence.

“Did Vader send you?” Luke whispered, raising his eyes to her face. She must have been striking once. The eyes that met his were bright green and she had high cheekbones and pretty lips, but the aristocratic set of her features was marred by a burn scar that ran from her temple to the corner of her lip. She also seemed a good decade or more older than him going by the thinness in her face and the hard-bitten look in her eyes. 

“No.” She reached to her utility belt, unclipped something and held it out to him. 

Another lightsaber.

Luke felt beyond confused. More so, when he grasped it and instinctively knew it was _his_. This woman must have tracked down the redhead and gotten it back, except... He looked down at it. He had constructed his lightsaber scarcely a month ago. This one had dents and scratches all over the hilt as if it had been well used. He thumbed on the activator switch and the green blade sprang up. It felt his, he would know, he’d attuned the crystal to himself…

“It’s yours.” The woman stood up and clipped her new lightsaber --the one she'd just finished constructing-- to her belt and he noted there was another one like it at her other hip. “I wouldn’t question it too much.”

He shut the lightsaber off. “Tell me who you are.”

“No.” She shook her head. “The less you know the better. Trust me.”

He frowned, not liking the sound of that. “What do you want? Why have you brought me here?”

She nodded. “Fair enough. Let’s just say that someone wants you dead and I want to see that doesn’t get carried out before you can do what you need to do.”

“What do I need to do?” She shook her head again and he made a frustrated sound. “I already know the Empire wants me. I’ve been avoiding them for years. I don’t need a bodyguard.” 

“Too bad. You’re getting one for now,” she replied. “Where to?”

He looked at her oddly. “What do you mean 'where to?'”

“Where were you going with your Rebel friends?”

“Why would I tell you? I know nothing about you. You could be an Imperial agent -- you _talk_ like --”

“We don’t have time for this. Where?”

“You can’t _force_ me to trust you. You haven’t demonstrated--” The next was lost when he felt a weird buzzing in his head. He instinctively knew to shield but it was too late, he felt a painful intrusion that hurt more once he realized she was digging through his mind. 

_Dagobah_.

The next thing he knew his cheek was against the cool floor of the lounge. She crouched by him. 

“It doesn’t hurt if you don’t resist.”

And the shame of it -- it was the second time she’d just moved him around as if she had the _right_ , and he was a _Jedi_ , and if she meant harm to his friends or Master Yoda…

Luke had his blade in hand in an instant and flew at her. He was still heavier than her, and that fact coupled with the surprise allowed him to send her sprawling with him over her, his lit blade by her throat.

Her eyes betrayed no fear. He hadn’t really expected any, not from anyone that battle scarred. “I mean your master or your friends no harm. Put that away, Jedi. Anger is of the dark side.”

That wasn’t enough. “Who are you?”

“I won’t answer that question. You’re not going to kill me. Put the lightsaber away.”

“I know nothing about your intentions.”

“I told you about my intentions. If I wanted you dead, Skywalker, I would have left you at Jabba's.”

“Who sent you?”

“No one sent me.”

“Why are you doing this?”

There, a brief pained look passed over her features. “I made a mistake," she said. "I want to correct it.”

Luke reached towards her with the Force and found...nothing.

“Why can’t I feel you through the Force?”

“Because I don’t want you to.”

He thought of Master Yoda. Hadn’t he done something similar to hide, cloaked his Force presence? But he intuited this woman was nothing like him.

“I’m not like your master,” she said softly.

“Stop that,” he growled at her.

“Your shielding needs work.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “And you’re the one to teach me?”

At that she laughed. “I have nothing to teach you. Put your lightsaber away. I’ll take you to your master.”

Master Yoda had taught Jedi for close to a century. This woman couldn’t be that powerful. He just needed to concentrate --

“Don’t,” she warned. 

He ignored her. He _needed_ to find out if she could be trusted. Keeping a stable hold on his lightsaber her reached out to her forehead. Calling the Force to himself, he searched among the flow to that point, a clear absence that wasn’t an absence at all…

Again a morass of gloom, hate and despair exploded into his awareness. Like Dagobah’s cave. Like Vader. He barely noticed when her elbow came up, swatting his hold over the lightsaber hilt and it went flying. She slid away from underneath him. 

Evil.

“The dark side,” she said going over to his lightsaber and deactivating it. “Is strong in me.” She offered it back.

“Why are you helping me then?” His skin was crawling. He wanted nothing more than to get as far away from her as possible, but despite all the dark he’d felt, there was no evil _intent_ , at least not towards him. It made no sense. 

“I told you. I made a mistake.” She sighed and the dark side aura vanished. “Someone else is coming for you.”

“The woman at the sail barge?” Luke asked, standing. “The redhead.”

A strange expression crossed the woman’s face. “Not her. Someone like me.”

Luke stood and took the lightsaber from her hands, puzzling over her words. Like her -- dark sider? Strong in the Force? “So you keep me safe then what?”

Her lip twisted. “Then you save the galaxy. Come on now, hero. You need to comm your friends and tell them you got another ride.”

\-- 

Luke had told Leia he had some business in Tatooine and that he’d regroup with them at the designated rendezvous point when he could. She wasn’t happy, considering they'd looked for him but couldn't find his X-wing. Some of Jabba's lackeys probably had it. He'd deal with that later. It was enough that Artoo was with Leia and the rest of them still.

Luke knew that Leia could sense his omissions. She'd probably wondered about who he'd left Jabba's with or where he was going next, but they'd all been pressed for time. Luke had never mentioned specifics about Dagobah to Leia before. Even without the mysterious woman, he wasn’t sure he would have. He'd asked Leia to trust him, and was grateful when she'd left it at that.

The trip to Dagobah from Tatooine would take four days. He knew the woman was avoiding him, but Luke couldn’t take the questions and he didn’t even make it through half of the first day before he went into room after room of the ship looking for her. If she was locked up in her cabin then that would be one thing, but if she wasn’t…

Luke found her sharpening a vibroblade at the lounge. She’d said no one sent her, but she was clearly a warrior of some sort. A dark sider. Who _was_ she? Why did she want him alive so badly? What mistake could make a dark sider act against their natural instincts for destruction?

“What do I call you?” Luke asked.

She grunted, but didn’t look up. “Whatever you want.”

“Just make up a name.”

“Names,” she murmured idly as she tested the blade. “Are for things that exist.”

“You exist.”

She turned and the scar was all he could see for a split second. Luke wondered how it had happened. What kind of battles had she been embroiled in to end up with it -- with all those scars? Against who?

“You would think so,” she was saying, breaking him from his thoughts. “And you’d be wrong.”

She didn’t say another word after that no matter what else he asked. 

\--

Luke had caught her practicing lightsaber sequences in the Suwantek's exercise room on the second day. His treks around the freighter had revealed it was souped up enough to rival any smuggler's ship, especially where weaponry was concerned. Not only that, it had several armories with everything from blaster rifles to grenade launchers to flame throwers. Definitely more than one person could handle, which lead Luke to think the woman might have stolen it from an imperial garrison. Not an easy thing to do unless...

Former Imperial then? That was fine. The Alliance thrived through plenty of 'enemy of my enemy equals friend' situations. He could too.

Luke had just left one of the armories when he heard a familiar humming coming from one of the adjacent rooms.

Curious, he hit the door panel.

She was doing lightsaber drills, one lightsaber in each hand, both a startling magenta color. One lightsaber was standard length, the other was shorter about half a normal blade’s length. He didn't recognize any of the sequences she was spinning and slashing into in a dizzying frenzy. The scene was at once impressive and depressing.

Who _was_ she? 

Briefly, stupidly, it occurred to him that if this woman really was serious about keeping him alive then maybe she should face Vader herself.

She stopped. She was breathing heavily and had ended with the standard blade in a lunge before her, the smaller one up above her head as if she were deflecting a blaster bolt with it.

He let the thought go. It would be too easy, wouldn’t it? Maybe if someone like her existed, then maybe others existed too, others like him.

Let them do it.

“There’s no one like you.” She went back to a defensive stance, the standard blade slightly lower in front of her, but its tip back up, and the shorter blade she held above her head now horizontally.

Luke glared at her. “Don’t do that.”

She sighed, but the corner of her mouth tipped a little. With the scar, it was more than a little unsettling. “Then practice your shielding.” She deactivated both lightsabers.

He tried another question as she went for a towel to wipe her face. “Why do you use two lightsabers? Is it a style -- ”

“It’s not a style,” she answered sharply. “It’s practical defense.”

He leaned a bit towards her. “Against what?”

She seemed to weigh it and finally blew out a breath. “A lightwhip.”

“Lightwhip.” He blinked. “Like a -- “

Her eyes grew sharp. “Just what it sounds like.”

“It sounds horrible.”

She smiled humorlessly. “It is.”

On a whim, he gestured to her scar. "Did a lightwhip do that?"

Even the shadow of that hollow smile left her face. "No."

Luke unclipped the lightsaber from his belt, hoping he could get more answers from her. “Why does it feel like mine, but look like this?” She didn’t answer and he continued. “I’m pretty sure the redhead at Jabba’s stole mine. This isn’t it.”

She chuckled like she was in on a private joke. Luke didn’t like it.

“I’m thinking of calling you 'Baldie.'” He felt a sliver of satisfaction when irritation flashed through her features.

“Call me whatever you like, farmboy.” 

Still, one thing was knowing his last name...“Farmboy?”

“That’s you isn’t it? Farmboy turned a war hero, turned last hope of the Jedi.” The words should be mocking, but only sounded strangely solemn.

Luke bit the inside of his cheek. This was why he was returning to Dagobah. He would complete his training and the title wouldn’t feel like he was playing dress up anymore. But even with all that he had to _keep doing_. Somehow. He'd take his lessons wherever he could find them.

“Spar, Baldie?”

She shook her head and shouldered past him. “I have nothing to teach you, Skywalker." 

\--

Luke had wandered into the cockpit once the proximity alarm started blaring and was surprised to see she wasn’t there. The minutes lengthened. When he realized she wasn’t coming, he settled by the nav computer himself to look at the course it was plotting. The computer scope pinged and he pulled the hyperspace lever to make the jump. 

The strangeness of her nagged at him. This was her ship. She’d never asked him to take care of the jump either.

Worried now, he stood from the chair and went towards the lounge. She wasn’t there or in the galley. Neither was she in the exercise room. He went to one of the cabins in the sleeping quarters. That one was empty. He tried the next, knocking when he found it locked.

“Hey?” he called, freshly annoyed at her reticence over something so basic as her name. No reply came and he knocked louder. She could be deep into meditation, but so much that she wouldn’t wake up for a proximity alarm? He didn’t think about it too much, just mentally flicked the door lock -- and froze.

A cold feeling assaulted him, followed by the overwhelming despair and rage he'd felt the last time. He pushed against it, anchoring himself on calm as he focused on the scene in front of him. The woman was sprawled on the floor on her stomach, utterly still, datacards and other objects strewn around her. An open duffel bag lay discarded at one end of the cabin. An image of her twisting it open in a rush, sending its contents flying across the room flitted into his mind.

Luke didn’t have time to speculate more. He dove towards the woman to check on her vitals, noticing that she was having small spasms. Her green eyes opened when he gently turned her over. 

“My bag,” she rasped. “Pulse gun--” she broke off with a grimace, just before her body spasmed again. “Four--” A sharp grunt interrupted her. He looked on, realizing the spams were getting worse. “Fourth setting,” she gasped out.

The next one looked like a full on seizure, and Luke found himself tapping on the Force for calm as he went through the room quickly, barely cognizant of the mess as he searched for anything that could resemble a pulse gun. In his peripheral vision he could see her writhing as if battling something unseen...and finally he found something vaguely similar to a holdout blaster in size near the legs of the bunk. He quickly picked it up, noting the thick blunted muzzle and settings that dialed up to four.

The woman was curled up into a ball shuddering violently. Luke pressed the gun into her hands and he could feel her drawing from the Force. It was surprising she got her hands on it with all the twitching, but the grip didn’t last long, the gun clattering away as another spasm overtook her.

Something inside him twisted at the sight. He had it in him to do something didn’t he? He called the Force to him, intending to at least --

She screamed. 

Luke's concentration vanished.

“You can’t,” she wheezed between spasms.

“What can I do?” he asked, suddenly the whirlwind of darkness felt impossibly close. He breathed in, tried to keep a hold on his calm. 

“Triggertriggertrigger.” Luke's eyes slid over to where the gun had fallen. She’d been about to use it. It was on the most powerful charge. All of it seemed _wrong_ , but nothing seemed wronger than leaving the woman to keep writhing uncontrollably on the floor -- it must have to do with some neurological response. He closed his hands around it and brought the gun back to her shaking hands.

Her eyes were closed, sweat streaming down her face. “Triggertriggertrigger.” 

If he took his hands from her the gun would fall, but she didn’t have sufficient control over her own limbs to work it. Inwardly steeling himself, he pulled the trigger.

The charge was so strong it stung his hands. Luke let go, dimly hearing the gun thud to the ground. He could _see_ it, a blue white coil, for the split second it spread through the woman, snapping her body back. The woman was motionless again.

Luke shivered. Everything was wrong and it centered on the woman who lay on the floor. Dark energy oozed around him, death, suffering, hate...cloying and inescapable. Had Vader felt like that? Vader had called on _his_ anger, his hate, his wish for revenge, this woman had done neither of those things. 

With growing horror, Luke wondered if it was because there was nothing. He thought of the darkness of the cave at Dagobah, no vision of Vader, no vision of himself, just an endless dark, stretching on forever, a black hole consuming the universe. No escape. No hope. He lost his grip on calm in the terror of it. A powerful wave of nausea hit him.

He should have found a way to escape. He should have fought back, just her _presence_ was quicksand mire--

He knew no more.

\--

Luke woke up in his cabin with a gasp.

Memories came in quick succession. That horrible darkness and the woman. He slowly got himself off the bunk.

His stomach rumbled and he left towards the galley, unsurprised that the woman wasn’t there. He got himself some food, ate it, and went towards the cockpit.

The woman was there at the nav computer.

Luke shot her a glare. “You weren’t here when the proximity alarm went off.”

She didn’t answer.

“What was that?” Luke clenched a hand into a fist. “You’re a Sith, aren’t you?”

He thought he saw her stiffen. “Sith is the institution. I’m not Sith.” 

“Then what are you?”

Her eyes settled on him. “I told you, the dark side is strong in me.”

“What was that? In your cabin.” She didn't respond. “You can’t do this to me,” he began sharply, giving free reign to days of frustration. “You say you’re here to keep me safe, but it’s not clear that you can keep _yourself_ safe. Who knows what could have happened if I hadn’t found you?”

Part of him knew, he should be going through a calming exercise, maybe rushing to his cabin to meditate, but he’d felt enough of a pawn of fate as it was to tolerate it gracefully from a random woman, strong Force user or not, self proclaimed protector or not. “Do you have the ship in autopilot? Maybe you’d like us to bounce into a supernova? Is that the plan after all, some suicide mission with me as a bonus? You don’t need to bother, it’s clear that you can easily get rid of me, so if that’s the end goal, have at it and stop all this skulking around.”

“It wasn’t always like that,” she said quietly after a moment. “It used to be easier to manage.”

“What?”

She turned in her chair to face him. “The thing that causes the seizures. It’s a type of mindlink.”

Luke frowned at her and went for the only type of bond he knew of. “Like a training bond?”

She shook her head. “No. It runs deeper.”

It was difficult to imagine a deeper version of a training bond. It was hard enough to deal with control over oneself to add in someone else into the mix. “Why does it do that to you?”

“Because the Sith on the other end keeps trying to rip it off.” Her eyes narrowed. “It’s a small comfort that she was probably drooling on the floor herself while it was happening. Shocking the nervous system works like hitting the reset button.”

His mind was still stuck on one fact. “You’re bonded to a Sith.”

“I’m not thrilled.” She sighed. “Sometimes when you’re off balance, it's not about responding, it's about changing the question.”

He didn't much like when Ben or Yoda talked like that. He _hated_ when she did. “Stop being cryptic.”

The woman's eyes narrowed. “She was killing me. I thought I’d take her with me.”

That gamble from someone like her didn’t surprise him, but he found himself thinking back to that scream she’d let out when he reached out to her with the Force. “Why couldn’t I help you?”

“The power I access is different from yours. You've noticed how my Force presence affects you.”

He nodded. Every time she didn’t keep herself closed down, he felt like he was drowning in darkness. “Why is it like that?" 

She shrugged. 

"I've felt the dark side before," he insisted. "It hasn't felt like that."

"Not all dark siders are the same."

"So my Force presence affects you like that too?”

“No.” A strange expression came over her face, for a second he thought it looked a lot like wistfulness and then it was gone. “Not usually. My shielding has to go way down for that to happen. But if it does…” She shrugged. “Light side healing doesn't exist for someone like me. Satisfied?”

He scowled. “I still know next to nothing about you. Not even your name.”

She went back to the computer. “And you’re not getting it, so don’t waste our time.”

“Why is it secret?” A thought occurred to him. “Are you afraid others will target you for helping me?” Master Yoda had never mentioned other dark side users other than the Emperor and Vader, but it was a big galaxy…

She wouldn't say anything more.

\--

“I have a Z-95 Headhunter you can use to get planetside,” she surprised him by announcing when he walked into the cockpit after they dropped out hyperspace on the fourth day. “It has no hyperdrive and this ship has a tractor beam, if you’re thinking of making a run from it.” 

She was looking back at him over her shoulder and fixed him with a warning stare. “Make no mistake, if the Sith hunting you finds you -- and she will, she won’t just kill you. She’ll make you suffer and then she’ll send whatever’s left of you to your friends as a memento.”

Luke shuddered. 

The woman turned in the pilot's chair and gestured to the navigator's seat. “Sit. I need to borrow your memories.”

Luke took a step back, remembering how it had felt when she’d plucked Dagobah from his mind. “You’re not going inside my head again.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “I can’t have you broadcasting that I’m here to a _Jedi Grand Master_.”

“Grand Master?”

She flashed him a skeptical look. “You have a lot of history to read up on, Skywalker.” She gestured to the seat again. “It doesn’t hurt if you don’t resist. I promise.”

Luke was still frowning at her. “What exactly are you going to do?” 

She looked at him with all the openness of a durasteel wall.

“It’s _my_ mind you’re tangling with.”

“I mean to take all your memories of me," she replied after a moment. "I’ll return them once you’re back.”

“Won’t I know there’s gaps in my memories?”

“I can create proxies,” she explained. “Unless your master is looking he won’t find anything and you won’t feel anything differently. I’ll input an impulse to come back as soon as you’re done with your training.”

His eyes widened. “'Input an impulse'? Like a computer command?” he recoiled. “Program me? _No!_ ”

She shook her head at him. “Without the impulse, it’ll be like going back to the beginning. You’ll be scared once I grab you. It’ll make everything messier.”

“But that’s not...you can’t --”

She stood up and approached slowly. “I'm keeping you alive, Skywalker,” her voice lowered to a cold whisper. “And you have no idea the lengths I’ll go to do it. No one is standing in my way. No one. Not even you.”

By all counts that should terrify him. The foul dark side aura swirled just below her words unchecked, but her eyes were murky with pain, a confounding abyss of it.

“What happened to you?” Luke found himself whispering despite the revulsion her Force presence let loose in him. 

"Nothing.” Her control was back in place, the dark aura hidden away. “Sit, _please_.” 

Against his better judgement Luke went to sit. She hadn’t really done anything to earn his trust, had she? She’d essentially kidnapped him -- but hadn’t she helped him at Jabba's? Hadn't she brought him to where he wanted to go? Hadn’t she let him contact Han and Leia? He hadn't felt any maliciousness directed at him.

And yet, she was a _dark sider_ , and everything he’d been taught about them, everything he knew, was that causing suffering and destruction was who they _were_. Why shouldn’t he be clawing to get free at any cost? He’d done more over less. Who knew what her ultimate aims were?

He didn’t understand. The worst part was that maybe he could -- if he just talked to Yoda, but she was going to take that possibility away too and there was nothing he could do about it. 

"I'm not compromising what I'm here to do for you to feel more comfortable. You know I mean you no harm."

"Stay out of my mind," he snapped at her. "How do you expect me to trust you if you keep doing that?"

"Stop projecting then, hero." She sighed. "I'd let you check my motives again, but we know how it's going to go."

She was right about that too. Luke wasn't eager to getting slapped with all that dark side aura again. She was smiling crookedly, like she found his predicament quaint. “Nothing is as mysterious as the will of the Force. Can I begin?” 

Nothing to be done then, but trust his feelings and hope he wasn't making a fatal mistake. It wouldn't be the first time either. He wondered if it would ever get easier. 

Luke nodded and she brought her hands to his temples, closing her eyes. “Easy,” she murmured. “I’ll be gentle.” 

He breathed in, feeling the brush of her mind against his, whisper light, along the pathways of his mind. She was right, it didn’t hurt. He found himself following behind her into the memories as if they were rooms. Her brown cloaked figure always vanished like a phantom before he could reach her, leaving only his memory. For a second something felt off, but then that feeling too vanished. 

How could it feel like this? With her being a dark sider? She was _in his mind_. Why wasn't he overwhelmed by disgust? 

Her voice came back like a breeze. _Because what you see is a lie._

_There is no truth in the dark side. Everything is a lie._

If so, no matter how horrifying, he needed to know. He would always choose the truth, he knew that about himself now. Quickening his steps, he caught up with her in the last memory-room. He stretched a hand to the hood of her cloak, his fist closed around it and he pulled. 

_Everything..._

Tendrils of red gold hair spilled out, she whirled in surprised, green eyes wide enough that he could see the hazel flecks in them, her face unblemished, if anything with a faint shimmer about it. She was breathtaking and he gasped, reaching out to her cheek -- 

The systems alarms of his ship sounded frantically as Luke approached Dagobah’s turbulent atmosphere. There was an oddness to the way he’d just woken from his hibernation trance, but he pushed it aside to focus on landing. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Normal caveats that perfect is the enemy of the good. I really don't want to linger overlong with this one. Hopefully by next weekend it will be done (at the latest), warts and all *fingers crossed* unless something punches me in the face. 
> 
> Edit 9/21: I did get punched in the face by work, but rest assured part 3 is in progress, for better or worse. *waves*
> 
> Last point: there's a lot of tumblr blaming to be done here. I regret nothing.

The Suwantek’s boxy shape emerged in the Headhunter's canopy as Luke left Dagobah’s atmosphere. He adjusted the Headhunter’s approach to it instinctively, even as he continued lost in thought.

He would have to face Vader again.

Ben’s words hadn’t been any comfort, even as they looped in his head. He’d known, of course, that he’d have to, just as he’d known that Leia was his sister, but the truth of it...it felt different.

There’s no escaping destiny, Ben had said. That was the crux of it. He was destined to kill his father. His father was evil.

Hadn’t he felt the good in him?

Luke focused on the landing, bringing the Headhunter into the freighter’s docking bay. He hit the controls for the canopy and jumped down to where a slender flightsuit-clad figure waited below, hair shorter than any military cut he’d seen, a gruesome scar running down the left side of her face.

“Welcome back,” she said and Luke felt disoriented suddenly. Why couldn't he sense her…?

She reached to his forehead, for a second it was too much, an overflow of information, a sleight of hand and there was a shift--

He blinked. “Baldie?”

She graced him with a sour look, green eyes flashing. “Charming.” Her voice dipped a bit in puzzlement. “You’re back earlier than I expected.”

His throat tightened. “Master Yoda, he…” Luke shook his head. He took a breath. “This part of my training is done.”

She cocked her head.

“I’m to face Vader to complete my training.” Luke looked away, it felt strange to say it out loud. And why stop there, he thought bitterly. “He’s my father, you know.” And Leia...

Something in the woman’s face flickered. Not surprise. Recognition.

“You know.”

Luke almost expected her to deny it, but she didn’t. 

She’d already started moving toward the interior of the ship. He walked after her. “I’m to report to the Alliance’s Headquarter’s Frigate near the Brema sector.”

She stopped in the corridor. “Aren’t you going to face Vader?”

“I need to know if I’m needed in any operations -- I can’t just leave everyone in a lurch.” Luke sighed. “It’s not like Vader’s going anywhere.”

“Your joining any operations sounds like the fastest way of sabotaging them.” 

“People are still counting on me.” He started walking on ahead. “I suppose I can just give myself up,” he mused. “Eventually.”

She made a noncommittal sound.

He stopped as they got to the cockpit and impulsively reached for her arm.

“Why isn’t it you? Facing Vader.”

She yanked it back. “That’s not how it goes.”

“How what goes?”

“You have to face Vader. You have to face the Emperor. And you kill them both.”

Luke gaped at her for a second then burst out laughing. That had been essentially what Yoda and Ben had asked from him, she’d just been blunt. It was refreshing, even if it was like being asked over and over to cross the Dune Sea on foot -- even if he were being crushed under the impossible weight of it.

“I’m not -- I’m not even a full Jedi.”

She hadn’t asked though. She’d been certain. She turned away and he reached for her arm again.

“How? How do you know? You saw a vision?” Luke bit his lip and released her. “My master said the future is always in motion.” Yoda had been right, and he felt himself reflexively flexing the fingers of his right hand, phantom pain surfacing at the memory. “You can’t trust it.” 

The woman just stared back, expression unreadable.

Ben had said it’d been his destiny and he’d known he couldn’t inflict that on Leia, but Ben hadn’t known about this silent, tormented woman who’d claimed to want to keep him alive. And she was strong. “You’re as powerful as Vader, aren’t you? You have a better shot at it than I do.”

She snorted. “You have an over inflated view of my abilities. Besides, it has to be you.”

“Why?” The woman turned away and he should have known better than to expect any answers from her. “You know what? Nevermind.” He went towards the nav computer to enter in the coordinates of the rendezvous point and tossed himself into the co-pilot’s seat.

“Whatever you saw,” he couldn’t help saying after a long moment, “It’s just one possible future.” 

The deck thrummed as they accelerated away from Dagobah.

“It wasn’t.” Luke lifted his head and caught her melancholy expression through her reflection in the viewport. Her eyes met his through the transparisteel. 

He was about to ask what that meant when the computer signaled it was done with the calculations for their first jump. He took one last lingering look at Dagobah. Ben and Master Yoda had seemed to have all the answers. The woman pulled the hyperdrive lever and the Suwantek plunged into hyperspace.

Now he had none.

\--

With a click, the upper half came loose from the lightsaber hilt . A few delicate turns exposed the crystal chamber and the green synthetic crystal inside.

It had been imperceptible at first, but Luke was slowly becoming aware of what he’d known. The more he practiced with his lightsaber, the stranger it felt. Now, near a week after meeting the mysterious woman, that uncanny feeling had become undeniable.

When he went through all his drills, the lightsaber felt as it always had, as a part of him, but when he wasn’t using it, when he simply held its weight in his hand, a glimmer of something else peeked through, like a vague shape in a foggy mirror.

Luke thought of the thumbprint-locked leather bound volume with instructions he’d found at Ben’s home -- that Ben had left for him as if he’d always known that he’d become a Jedi. Ben hadn’t doubted.

The crystal floated up in his palm. When Luke touched it with his mind, it lit up with an emerald glow.

Luke could see himself pouring all his hope, all his need into the crystal. He saw himself looking impatiently into the furnace as it readied the crystal through heat and pressure. He remembered that, but submerged in the crystal's aura -- the energy _he'd_ poured into it -- there was an odd...space, as if he were looking at himself from afar. 

Luke was back to himself, the crystal now back in his palm. He remembered making his lightsaber, sitting at Ben’s table feeling anxiety and concern over Han mount, dispelling it to work on the task at hand...

His eyes roved over the crystal. Why had it felt as if he’d been looking into someone else’s memories?

Frustrated, he reassembled his blade, again noting the scratches and dents along its previously pristine hilt.

Luke ran his thumb along one. Could he…?

__

_The green blade was bright in the twilight. It lit the woman’s face. She seemed younger, almost girlish by comparison, even if her eyes were hard and hate-filled. The scar was red and horrible. Recent._

_One slash from a red blade and it tumbled out of the woman’s hands, clattering against a fountain a yard away. She seemed to be in some kind of outdoor space. A garden of some sort._

_“You’re not fit to carry it,” a haughty male voice rang out. “Have you ever even used it?”_

_The woman went to get it without a word. She deactivated it._

_“To fight?”_

_She kept her silence, but when she looked back at speaker her green eyes stared loathing. She clipped the blade back onto her belt._

_“Pathetic. He should have killed you. Dying is all of you are good for.” The owner of the voice moved away with a sigh and shut down his lightsaber. He was tall and had a gaunt, aquiline face. “But better you than us.” He went to a pile of objects off to the side. Training swords. He threw one to her. She caught it easily and shifted into a guard position. “All to put a good show, huh, Hand? For anything real, there’s Inquisitors. We always wondered how long that office would last. All of you children playing with powers you can’t possibly understand. The Emperor’s limbs,” he mocked._

_He was upon her in an instant, moving faster than she could counter.Too quickly, his practice sword slapped against her leg, she let out a cry and collapsed._

_When she looked up her eyes were soaked with fear “I can’t feel--”_

_Her trainer laughed as he approached. “Pelko venom. Temporary paralysis, Hand. In a real fight you’d have lost your leg. Now, what would you -- ”_

_She swept her working leg through his, snapping it back to slam her heel against his face as he came down. She called his wooden sword to her as she whirled to straddle him, the wooden sword high as she prepared to bring it down in a crushing blow. He lifted a hand and she was launched off a few meters away as if she’d been struck by an invisible fist._

_Her instructor laughed and wiped the blood from his face. He stood approaching her struggling form on the grass. She seemed to be fighting against invisible restraints keeping her pinned to the ground._

_“I was remiss. Combat training, of course. You’re all such good little soldiers.” He lifted a hand and she floated up a good two meters off the ground. “But you still have so much to learn.” He swept a hand through the air and she was slammed to the ground and lay there, groaning weakly._

_…_

_“The Aing-Tii cannot shelter you any longer.”_

_The being who spoke was about two meters tall, stood on two feet, a large tail behind them, covered with bony plates from tail to head. It wore a flat circular object about the size of a human hand on its chest, from which its modulated voice emerged. On one hand it held a cylindrical object vaguely resembling a microphone, in the other it held out the lightsaber to her._

_“You may have your weapon back.”_

_The woman was sitting on a riverless bank, white stones all around, the wind whipping through her grey headscarf. She drew her knees to chest, looking as if she’d received a blow. Some time had passed, her scar no longer looked as garish, but her eyes were no less haunted._

_“But my healing…,” she protested eyes skittering up to the being above her. "You have to take his voice out of my head. You have to."_

_“We cannot. You must answer your master's call or cross beyond the veil.”_

_“My work for you has not finished.” She reached up to grasp the lightsaber placing it beside her, still gazing up imploringly to the being._

_“The Prophet has decided it has.”_

_“You--” her voice died. She licked her lips and tried again. “You know what that means, you've seen it. I can’t be part of that again, I can’t...”_

_“We can help you cross beyond the veil if you wish.”_

_Disquiet emerged in her eyes. “What lies there?”_

_The being lowered its head. “We don’t know.”_

_She turned her head to stare off to the distance. A mass of homesteads were lined along a distant canyon._

_“The Aing-Tii cannot give you the answers you seek.”_

_Her voice was pained. “But you see the future.”_

_“We see many. You can too.”_

_“I can’t.” She shook her head adamantly. “I can’t.”_

_“You won’t let yourself, Archivist.”_

_"There's no future." She gritted her teeth, once more turning towards the being. “And what's the use in seeing the possible pasts if you can’t change it?”_

_“The knowledge that the stream continues.”_

_“That my life is meaningless.” The frustration ebbed and she pressed her forehead against her gathered knees._

_“All life is meaningless in the flow of the stream…” The being’s head bobbed. “You still do not see.”_

_“See what?” She raised her voice, upset again. “All I’ve seen is that I made a terrible mistake and there was never any hope of me not making it.”_

_“Soft eyes, Archivist,” the being chided patiently. “Only with soft eyes will you be able to see not just your stream, but the many.”_

_Her gaze was clouded when she lifted her head. “They'll kill me. When I come back. If my master doesn’t, then his...servants. Those after me are stronger. I've been your archivist, I’ve found and studied your priceless relics like you asked of me, and for that you’re condemning me to die.”_

_“The Prophet has seen your fear. For your service, the Aing-Tii is prepared to make you a gift beyond measure.”_

_“You don’t need to. Just -- just let me stay,” she begged. “You need me. An infidel is the only one that can touch your relics.”_

_“We cannot.”_

_Her face crumpled as if she meant to cry, but she slowly breathed in until her face was devoid of any emotion at all, becoming as white as the stones around her._

_..._

_Whispered laughter floated up from the darkness._

_The lightsaber hummed it as lit the woman’s face with its greenish glow. The scar stood in relief, even among the soot and dirt that covered her face._

_“Come on,” she muttered._

_A crack echoed and the woman jumped back as the ground shook. By the dim light, the ground beneath her feet seemed to be splitting. Something seemed to be coming out. Only bits and pieces were visible by the light -- whatever it was it was reddish brown and massive._

_The woman gasped. The earthquake stopped after a minute and she whispered, “Open.”_

_“Open,” she called again, stronger. “Judge my worthiness if you need to. But I need you.”_

_She paused as if she were hearing an unspoken question. “Because I found you. Because I have enemies that I can't hunt alone. You’re made to serve? Serve me.”_

_..._

_“You were a fool to come after me.”_

_The muscular, dark haired man had no longer said the words than he wiped out his blaster._

_The lightsaber was in the woman’s hands in an instant as she batted the bolts away, backflipping to a loading cart in the busy spaceport. She’d whipped out a pistol with her left hand and shot, before jumping down in quick pursuit. She looked older than before, her face thinner, her hair still cut close to her head._

_Around them maintenance workers and crews cried out and immediately started running towards the landing strip past the hangar doors._

_The man moved away, but it was no common blaster bolt that followed the woman’s shot, rather multiple durasteel darts fanned out. The man danced away from most of them, returning fire. She shot again, spinning to avoid the volley of shots._

_Cartridge apparently done, the woman tossed the blaster. The man continued shooting and she caught the bolts with the blade. She extended the arm that had held the blaster and several disks whooshed out._

_He took cover by jumping behind an enormous loading droid, a couple of the disks embedding themselves into the crates around the hangar. “A lanvarok?” he yelled. “I’m flattered. I don’t even know your name.”_

_“You’re a special guy, Kogo,” the woman’s voice came out. She’d taken cover herself behind a set of crates._

_He threw a grenade in her direction. She narrowly managed to get out in time from the first explosion, but the lightsaber went flying from her hands.The explosion caught the flammable materials in the barrels nearby and soon the entire hangar was consumed by flames. The screams of the spaceport workers and patrons mingled with the bursts of minor explosions all around._

_One of these slapped the woman off her feet and against the side of a ship several feet away. She rolled herself onto her stomach with a grunt, levering to a crouching position, extending a hand to call the blade back._

_She looked in the direction of the hangar doors where the crowd was fleeing. With a resounding crash, they closed and screams rang out from the spaceport as the multitude of beings found themselves stampeding in the opposite direction to the narrow access corridors in panic. The hangar had degenerated to a hellish flaming pit._

_“Ah-ah,” the man’s voice rang out a good two meters behind her. “No taking the easy route.”_

_The woman clutched the lightsaber tightly, and with a grimace, she stood among the flames to face her opponent, bringing the lightsaber to a middle guard position._

_He laughed and raised his hand. Various bits of flaming crates, carts, and loading material launched themselves at her. She moved out of the way, but not fast enough to miss all of them. Others, she slashed at, but she didn’t get all of those either._

_The impact of various crates threw her down. For a moment, she lay on the ground just starring ahead, eyes unfocusing, but the barrage didn’t lessen. She jumped to her feet, missing a crate, but not a panel of flaming circuitry. It slammed her down, leaving flames licking up her the leg of her flightsuit. She screamed launching herself into a roll, slapping away the flames. She dragged herself up with difficulty, standing shakily._

_All around the woman and the man, panicked people continued gathering in a chaotic mass around the two exits._

_The man advanced and picked up the lightsaber that she’d dropped. “You can do so much with the Force alone.” He made a gesture and flames nearby coalesced into a ball incinerating those closest to the exit._

_The woman shook her head. “Always making a mess,” she croaked, coughing. The action drew a wince from her._

_The huge loading droid lifted above launching itself towards her. She rolled herself out of the way as it dropped. Its crash against the ground sent permacrete flying all around, pieces of it felling those unfortunate enough to be up to a yard away from the woman, making the ground shake._

_Then suddenly the ground shook even more violently. The woman threw herself down and away behind a piece of a ship as the hangar doors blew apart. The entire structure momentarily clouded with more flames and smoke. When it cleared the sky beyond the hangar doors would be visible -- if not for the massive reddish brown eye-like orb that blocked it out._

_What was left of the crowd shot out towards the open permacrete._

_The woman got on her feet shakily and stumbled, half-limping towards a barely recognizable human form on the ground, the lightsaber a few feet away._

_He kept making gurgling sounds as if trying to speak._

_She quickly called the lightsaber, turned it on, and in a fluid arc, lopped off his head. That done, she deactivated the blade, and clipped it onto her belt. With the same halting, tortured gait she made her way towards the huge sphere, which slowly descended, waiting. The surviving spaceport patrons and workers fanned out, hysterically running past it without a second look._

_The beings passed her too, running out at full speed while she went, step by halting step, holding her arms around herself. She half stumbled into the hatchway that had emerged from the vessel. Once there, she collapsed onto all fours as the vessel lifted into the air over the smoking spaceport._

_For a long moment, she simply breathed, head bowed down, blood from a gash at the side of her head dripping on the ground of the cockpit. It was an empty space, no seats or instruments only the viewport, which looked out to the wreckage below and the frantically dispersing crowd, growing smaller as the ship rose._

_“I’m fine.” She rasped as if to a silent question, raising her head. “A little later and you would have been on your own.”_

_She leaned back onto her knees. “Open me a line to the Star Destroyer in orbit.”_

_A few moments later a voice came through. “Unknown vessel? This is Star Destroyer Eradicator. Identify yourself.”_

_She took a breath and when she spoke her voice was steady and authoritative. “Put me through to your commanding officer.The recognition code is Hapspir, Barrini, Corbolan, Triaxis.”_

_“At once.” The voice said quickly._

_Another voice burst through the comm. “This is Captain Erron. Who is this?”_

_“This is the Emperor’s Hand. I’ll be taking over Vess Kogo’s assignments from this point on.”_

_The person on the line gasped but managed to control himself. “Shall we continue as indicated?”_

_An expression of unease passed through the woman’s features. “No. My ship is more than adequate for the task.”_

_“A ship that small doesn't have the firepower to lay waste to an entire city...”_

_The woman breathed in, closed her eyes, and there was a crackling sound coming from the comm._

_Her voice was low when she spoke again. “Would you question me if I were Vess Kogo?”_

_A wheeze came from the line. “The Emperor--”_

_“The Emperor expects complete and unwavering obedience. You have been briefed on proper protocol on asset claiming. I am the Emperor’s Hand and you are now at my service.”_

_There was a dull thud and silence on the line. “Who is the next commanding officer?”_

_“That would be me, Vexan Styder, Emperor’s Hand. What are your orders?”_

_She opened her eyes. “Stay in orbit, Captain Styder. Wait for my signal. I am sending you the coordinates for the jump. Jump as soon as you receive my signal. We will rendezvous at the Senex sector.”_

_“Yes, Emperor’s Hand.”_

_“Close the line, Ship.”_

_“You know what to do,” she said wearily after a moment. “Go give them a show. Enjoy.”_

_Her face changed from weariness to annoyance as the seconds passed. “I have a fractured arm, several broken ribs, burns, and a concussion,” she snapped. “And I haven't even fully taken stock yet. I’m sorry I can’t summon your enthusiasm for destruction.”_

_“Yeah?” she muttered idly. “How sad for you that your apprentice lacks the appropriate level of sadism.”_

_She sighed. “I’m just tired, Ship. Let’s get this done.”_

_A stricken look briefly passed through her features as she looked out the viewport, but it faded quickly. She closed her eyes and breathed in._

_The vessel started firing._

_…_

_“I thought I’d find you here,” a man’s voice echoed in the darkened space lit only by the green light of the blade. “You weren't always such a scholar, were you? All that travel to ruin after ruin makes you very hard to find, Jade.”_

_The man laughed, a boisterous sound that reverberated along the stones. “Is that the point?”_

_She kept silent. The green blade was at her side, its illumination washing over her face._

_“Jedi ruins are an...idiosyncratic selection for a hiding place, I’ll give you that. I’d accuse you of nostalgia, but...” He shrugged and stepped forward more fully into the path lit by the blade. He was lithe, dark haired man about the woman’s age. “None of us have an affinity to the light. It makes the hunt that much more interesting, don’t you think?”_

_“Our master’s Will be done.” She tipped her head deferentially._

_“So formal.” He chuckled. “He’s not here.”_

_“He’s always here.”_

_“Of course.” A note of impatience came into his voice. “You know what I mean. I meant to ask about Cronal. At first I thought it had been Lumiya -- with Kogo gone, she’s the one that has enjoyed painting the walls with her prey. Its rare from you. You like your kills clean.”_

_He drew closer. Two lightsabers were clipped to the belt at either side of his waist. “What did dear old Cronal do to make you that angry?”_

_“Why?” She asked, her voice eerily soft. “Would you like me to paint the walls with you, Stele?”_

_He ignored the threat. “Some speculate it’s because Cronal fancied himself some sort of prophet. Did he try to read your future? That can be...annoying.”_

_The man unclipped his lightsabers. “Or maybe he read your past. They say it’s a sore point...after all these years. Still licking your wounds over not being the only one. Going as far as to disappear in a huff, as if the master would let you. So upset you have to earn your apprenticeship along with the rest of us.”_

_The green light of the blade shifted as it was brought to guard position close to her._

_“I talked to your ship outside. I see why the master let you live if you bring treats like that back to him. What else have you brought him, oh Great Imperial Procurer?" he continued sardonically. "He’s a marvelous beast at any rate. He did say he’d come with me if I bested you.” He grinned. “Where did you find him?”_

_“Try looking at holocron sometime.” The woman smiled. “You have no idea what you’ll learn.”_

_“I have looked at several, actually. Don’t think you’re the only one interested in learning all those dark secrets. Is that why you kept the lightsaber? Does it make you feel special, Jade?” He activated his blades, two red beams coming to life. “Or does it remind you that you’re not? But one would think looking in the mirror would be enough for tha--”_

_The green blade swung down in an arc right to left. As she swung she spun to the left, launching herself into a roundhouse kick. He avoided the first spinning swing and the kick, catching the final swing of her blade between his crossed blades. She ducked back in a flip, then lunged again, slashing diagonally from left to right, jumping as she raised it on her right and slashing back down. The flurry of strikes made her blade a flowing ribbon of green in the darkened space, forcing her opponent into furious defense._

_Their blades locked when the man blocked a midsection strike with both of his red blades, slashing to her left, sending sparks flying. Without breaking the lock, the woman threw her left leg forward, blocking and twisting into a lunge. The movement brought her past the man’s right, allowing her to get behind him. She spun quickly to remain facing him bringing her blade down. He blocked in the nick of time and she laughed._

_“You talk too much, Stele. All show.”_

_She narrowly missed the blade that came down inches from where her head had been. She flipped away again and he settled his blades horizontally as he waited. She gyrated her wrist, sweeping her blade up, he parried and her blade swung in an arc to the left and he blocked, lapsing into offensive -- windmilling his blades with enough force for her lightsaber to spill away from her hands._

_The woman slid under the blade as he slashed down, sweeping her legs as she called her blade back. He missed the sweep with a jump and whirled windmilling his blades again, but the woman kept to his back, avoiding his slashes, while lapsing into a rush of her own swings. She caught her opening after two high slashes, extending an open-palmed hand and Force throwing the man back against the stone wall opposite end. One of his lightsabers fell._

_The man raised his hand, but the woman shook her head slowly. With a sweep of her arm, his blade turned, and mimicking her motion, severed his arm at the forearm. The man let out a pain-wracked shout and lost his hold on his other blade. The woman gestured again and the first lightsaber severed his other hand. The man let out another agonized shout, ending in a gasp as he was left breathing shallowly._

_The woman shut down her lightsaber and clipped it to her belt. The only light remaining were the man’s two red blades, one of them on the ground, the other still floating before him vertically._

_The woman summoned both lit blades to her and approached, holding them in a reverse grip._

_“That’s the problem with style over substance,” she murmured. “Guess you’re not getting my ship after all.”_

_She stopped. “This was a temple of light once.” Her voice was contemplative._

_The man's voice rang out in the darkness. “What are you going to do?”_

_“What our master taught us.” Her disembodied voice was still quiet. She shut the blades, plunging the room into darkness. “I’m going to defile it.”_

_He started screaming._

__

Luke woke in cold sweat, breathing hard, the lightsaber still in his hands. He shivered, feeling sickened. He let go of the lightsaber, letting it fall to his lap. 

Had it been a vision? 

That had been his lightsaber, the very lightsaber in his lap, wielded by the woman. He looked down at it, reluctant to touch it suddenly. What else had it witnessed?

It couldn’t have happened in the time it took for the woman to get the lightsaber from the redhead, he couldn’t have been knocked out for more than several hours at most according to the chrono. Even if the woman had rigged the chrono, Leia would have said something if she’d been out of contact with him for days after their escape from Jabba’s.

Luke rubbed at his forehead, his insides roiling. It had been nightmarish, he could almost feel the press of the dark miasma from whatever that had been, that near endless rage and hopelessness.

She was a dark sider...was this some brand of elaborate torture? Was the she driving him insane?

Luke summoned calm. Ben, he called, shutting his eyes tight. Yoda? Am I losing my mind? No answers were forthcoming. There was nothing except the residue of all that horror.

No.

He opened himself to the Force, drawing it to him, easing himself into its flow, just as eased into him. He channeled it within him to the darkness at the edges of his mind, the fear, the despair, pushing them back. Knowledge both simple and profound came to him: there was always light.

Always.

Recentered, he looked down at the lightsaber. He didn’t know where that vision had come from. But no matter what, he trusted that knowledge, trusted it over all that darkness. Trusted it enough to bet his life on it. He grasped the lightsaber, closing his eyes. Even if it was _a_ future. He was not afraid …

Green eyes stared at him from the transparisteel. A memory. _Not a future_

A past.

His eyes opened.

\--

“Your name is Jade. You’re a Sith apprentice.”

She brought down both blades down in a swift cross-cutting slash.

“You’re ignorant,” was her swift reply. "To become a Sith you have to kill something you love." She whirled into a lightning fast sequence of slashes with both blades, ending with both horizontal, one in a reverse grip in front of her, the other in a conventional grip behind her head.

Her eyes met his squarely. "And don't get me wrong," she lowered her voice. "I've done a lot of killing..." Jade didn't finish the statement, deactivating and clipping the lightsabers to her belt.

He didn't flinch away from her gaze. He wondered of course, but other questions were more pressing. "Where did you come from?” He leaned against the doorway. “Or I should ask, ‘when’?”

Her frown got deeper. “That’s impossible.”

Just the fact she was replying meant something. The implications were amazing and frightening. His eyebrows raised. “You can tra--”

“No.” She raised her forefinger emphatically. “Whatever you’re thinking doesn’t exist.”

“Neither do you apparently, but here we are. So in the future dark siders go at each other’s throats.” Understanding dawned on him. “You can’t face Vader and the Emperor. You think this Sith hunting me will kill you--”

“That’s enough.”

“Because she can’t die unless you do.” He found himself Force flung back against the wall.

“I said that’s enough. How did you find out my name?”

He winced at the throb left from the impact, but he ignored her question, challenging, “What are you so scared of? If I kill Vader and the Emperor like you said I did--” He broke off as the breath died in his lungs at the thought. “No. I would never turn. I wouldn’t.”

Something twisted in the woman’s face. “Everyone can turn.”

He lifted his chin. “I would rather die.”

Her eyes flashed. “And you think that’s _better_? Jedi!” she spat the word like an epithet, suddenly incensed. “That is why all of you are extinct. Cowards! Dying was the easy part. All of them _one with the Force_ while the galaxy falls apart.”

He frowned. “Because giving in to easy power--”

“Easy power? You know don't know a blasted thing about the dark side.”

“I know how it feels.”

Her expression changed to contempt. “Tell me then, how does it feel, hero?”

Luke ground his jaw. “Like being alive while being dead, _Jade_.”

Her face hardened again. “Forget that name before I make you forget it.”

“Go ahead. I’ll find it again.”

Her face contorted suddenly and she brought a hand to her forehead just before her knees buckled. He caught her just as she teetered.

“Again?”

She nodded, launching into spasms. He slid her gently to the floor, scanning the room. A small satchel was off to one corner. He sprang towards it after making sure she was on her side. One look into its contents, and he discovered the pulse gun inside.

Jade was still convulsing when he approached. After rechecking his shields he pressed the muzzle of it to the small of her back and pressed the trigger. The was an electric crackle, the charge stinging his hands, wrapping around her body for a split second, and she went limp.

He felt the pressure of her Force presence, but his shielding held. He crouched down by where she lay curled on her side. 

Looking at her, he thought of the girl with the fresh scar on the ground and felt something wrench inside of him. He thought of her betrayal at the hands of those strange beings. How could they have turned her away? How could they have let her turn into this if they knew? They must have taught her _something_ , but then how…

Those brilliant eyes opened, hazy for an instant before lucidity brought them to their usual sharpness.

“You alright?” he asked softly.

“Why are you still here?”

He flashed her a lopsided smile. “You kidnapped me.”

Jade sat up. “No, I didn’t. I’m escorting you to your friends--” She brought a hand to her forehead. “That wasn’t -- just go.”

“You’re really okay?”

She glowered at him. “What’s it to you, hero?”

He stared at her, eyes locking on the disfiguring scar that crossed her face. His first thought had been that it was a burn scar, but on a closer look it seemed too linear. Then he knew, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized it before.

"Take a holo," she snapped. "It'll last longer."

It was a lightsaber scar.

“Who did that to you?”

A pained expression crossed her features. She looked away, but for the barest instant her eyes fell to his right hand and he _knew_.

Luke's breath felt dragged out from his lungs. "Vader did it."

She looked away and that seemed confirmation enough.

It shouldn’t have surprised him considering what Vader had done to him. He’d tortured Han and Leia too, hadn’t he? This woman had probably been through the same. Worse. She’d said everyone could turn. His stomach churned as he recalled the memory he'd seen. Vader had broken her, turned her into a monster. His own father.

No, never that. _Vader_. Always Vader. He’d just been lying to himself, trying to find what wasn’t there.

Jade had stood up. She grabbed the pulse gun and threw it inside the satchel.

And Vader meant to do the same to him. Luke clenched his hand into a fist. Ben and Yoda had been right.

Jade froze and whirled towards him as if she couldn’t bear it.

“You have it wrong.”

He raised his head to her. “What?”

"This," she gestured to her face, "was my _reward_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't help it, I love, love remixing EU elements so here we go, for anyone who cares: [ Aing-Tii](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Aing-Tii), [Ship](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ship_\(Sith_Meditation_Sphere\)), [Vess Kogo](), [Cronal](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cronal), [Marek Stele](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Maarek_Stele), [Lumiya](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Lumiya)
> 
> Yeah, I'm a total EU vulture. I regret nothing there too.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally done! Warts and all. Broken up for organizational purposes, hence both part 3 and the epilogue posted at once. This idea deserved pages and pages, but alas I am a lone fangirl with many, many other projects. This is the best I could do without taking a million more weeks. Hard enough to write as it was. My emotional logic, let me show you it. *pets fic*

“Your reward?” Luke echoed, standing. “Your reward for what?”

The brief burst of emotion had been carefully put away and Jade was just serious. “Killing you.”

Luke squinted at her. “What?”

Now she didn’t look away. He searched her face trying to see if there was any clue to this being a ruse. Jade didn’t so much as flinch. 

Luke wasn’t sure what he could say to something like that, but the questions just multiplied and he went for the simplest. “Why’d you do it?”

“My master ordered me to.”

Luke nodded, trying not to think of the weirdness of all of it -- the fact that here he was, talking calmly to a dark sider about her killing him. An alternate him. At least it was a kind of relief to know it had been that simple. “So Vader had you kill me then -- ” He gestured to her face. It didn’t make sense, but things had stopped making sense a lot time ago.

“Vader?” Her lip curved contemptuously. She reached to swing the satchel over one shoulder. “He was just another fool like the rest of us.”

The floor dropped from underneath him. “Your master was...the Emperor.” 

Jade nodded slightly. “Darth Sidious.”

It was different hearing it from her. The Emperor had been abstract to him for so long, evil, sure, as Ben and Yoda had said, but it was a distant evil. He’d never felt as near and loathed as Vader. Luke still caught himself thinking of Vader as his father’s murderer. Not as often as before, but sometimes...

“I was his hand,” Jade spoke as if lost in thought. “The Emperor’s Hand. That’s how I was known. So special because I could hear his call from anywhere, and report back to him the same way. His voice in my mind was a leash around my throat and I…” She smiled, a discomfiting violence in it. “I loved it. Loved him looking in on me, knowing where I was at every moment, loved him burrowing into my mind like it belonged to him.”

Luke remembered the instructor mocking her over the title. He stifled a shudder.

Jade returned to her recount. “I succeeded in everything he asked of me, and after that last task...he called Vader in and had me announce that I had destroyed the son of Skywalker.”

Luke stiffened. Had the Emperor also known of Vader’s offer? Revenge then.

Jade's voice lowered. “I didn’t know what Sidious had asked me to do. I didn’t know anything then. I did know that my master was there when Vader gave me the brunt of his anger...and he laughed.” 

It came to him with gruesome clarity. He could almost see Vader forcing her onto his blade by the hair, hear the screams and shrieks as the Emperor’s laughter echoed, smell the seared flesh. He closed his eyes, willing it all away, clinging to that center of calm.

“He _raised_ me.” Her hate simmered, just barely kept in check. “And then he threw me at Vader as if I were raw meat.” 

Luke could only look on in horror.

“I should have died then. I would have, but Vader...stopped. Not because of me.” She waved a hand. “I was nothing. Because he refused to give Sidious the pleasure. My master knew. That was the last act of insubordination that he tolerated from him.” 

When her eyes passed over Luke's face, the hate was back to a shadow. “Lucky me. You see, by surviving I earned another _reward_. I earned the privilege of being part of my master's great hunt. A proving ground for all his pets. Turns out I wasn't special." She let out a low laugh. "Not even close.” 

Luke thought of the man at the temple ruins.

_...you have to earn your apprenticeship along with the rest of us._

Jade raised her forefinger. Her next words seemed parroted, “A privilege, not a choice. Kill or be killed.” Her eyes grew distant. “Should have died a million times, but why give them the pleasure?" Contempt was back in her voice. "Just me and Lumiya now. Thought if I took her with me it'd be killing two hawk bats with one bolt. At least it would matter.”

It didn't sound like any of it would to Luke. All of it was senseless death, a callous disregard for life from the Emperor's part, but Luke turned his attention to one question. _The_ question. “How did you get here? Can the Emperor--”

“Sidious has no interest in streams," Jade scoffed. "Not when he has all the power he craves in his own.”

“Streams?”

She hesitated. “Time exists as a stream. That's why the technique for viewing the past or future is called _flow_ walking. You can’t change it, no matter how much you try. Throw a stone in a river and it will ripple, but never stop or direct the flow differently. But in a Force nexus, all the rules we know don't apply. The stone...can skip. That's where the queen of the stangin' Sith caught up with me.”

A ray of hope peeked through. "You’re free. With all your knowledge -- ”

“I was wrong. I didn't make just one mistake," she broke in. "I made two.” This time she did look away. “I didn’t know. I thought it would mean fixing it. I didn’t know she'd follow.” Her hand fell over the satchel where she'd tossed the pulse gun. "And here we are. Mindlinks limit the amount of self inflicted damage one can do. So unless you have the stomach to repay me the favor..." She looked up, a brief flowering of hope over her features.

That was possibly the most disturbing thing he'd seen in her yet, and Luke took a step back.

She sighed, back to her usual composure. "...I thought so. I do this the traditional way then."

Luke rubbed his face, trying to assimilate it all. "But the Emperor isn't making you hunt each other anymore. You can both be done with everything. This can be a fresh start." 

She stared at him as if he'd suggested she go pet a krayt dragon. "She's a Sith. She'll want you dead."

It was all so unnecessary. "Why?"

“That's who they _are_. Suffering and destruction gives them power. And..." Apprehension crossed over her face. "I wouldn't put it past her to have seen what I did when I last flow walked." Her lip twisted. "Picking it out from my brain like the carrion bird she is."

He cocked his head. “What did you see?”

“The destruction of the second Death Star,” she whispered with a soft smile. “I don't know how...I just...I felt Sidious die.”

“Second Death Star?” His eyes widened, alarm surfacing. “What second Death Star?”

But she was lost in ruminations. “The only thing different in that stream was that you lived. I thought he had me kill you as punishment for Vader’s treason. I don’t think that was it. He must have known that his death would happen at your hands somehow.” 

A beatific expression came over her face, eerie light. “And it must have made him afraid.”

\--

Shaken by all she'd said, Luke had stumbled back into his cabin to meditate. He was nowhere near strong enough to defeat Vader, his reluctance aside, defeating the _Emperor_ himself was unthinkable. All that killing didn't even _feel_ right. Not the way Jade talked about it.

At the back of his mind Luke felt the shift in velocity as the freighter dropped out of hyperspace. A thunk and a stretched out vibration broke through his concentration a short while after. They were firing? The nav map hadn't showed any asteroid fields or anything like that. Debris from some sort of battle? Two jolts to the ship later it was clear enough. That was no collision. 

Something was firing back.

Luke darted to the cockpit, just in time to see an orange-red sphere speed by them.

“What’s that?” 

The Rogues had long called TIEs eyeballs, but _that_ was an eyeball. Except for the -- he darted forward for a look, not quite believing his eyes -- the solar panels looked vaguely like bat wings. Closer to a TIE interceptor or 'squint', it's solar panels extended to its side. The thing was among the strangest ships Luke had ever seen. He looked over to where Jade was hunched over the controls.

"Jade! What is that thing?"

The enemy ship did a complete turn, and plasma started washing over the viewport. The Suwantek jolted and jerked under the onslaught.

Jade didn't answer, too focused on making them bank right, attempting to evade the sphere's firing. The Suwantek wasn’t known for its speed and more shaking followed. Luke found himself holding on to the copilot’s chair to avoid being tossed around the cockpit as it shook with increasing violence.

“Jade--”

“It’s Ship,” she said between gritted teeth. “She has him.”

“I know it’s a ship,” he snapped. “But what--”

“No,” she shot back. “That’s his name.”

“ _He_ ?“

Jade slammed a fist on the controls. “He was mine. I found him!” Briefly, her rage was all he could sense, a smothering feeling, before she got it back under control. 

“Wait a second. He?” Luke felt an odd sense of deja vu like a half remembered dream. _Her_ ship.

Her head snapped in his direction. “Sith Meditation Spheres are...sentient, kind of. Powerful. We can’t take it down from here. This freighter doesn’t have the speed or maneuverability for it.”

Luke was still stuck on one thing. “Sentient?” 

Jade cursed viciously. “We’re sitting mynocks here.”

He wasn’t following, but he didn’t need to. There was an enemy ship and it was shooting at them. It couldn’t get any more simple than that. “I’ll take the Headhunter out.”

Green eyes slid in his direction, considering.

Luke met her stare with a casual shrug. “I’m…” He couldn’t help the grin that came over his face. _This_ , he was sure about. “Not a bad fighter pilot.”

There was a split second pause, and she input commands into her sensor screen. “There. We have Mirnic coming up. If you can make Ship take a tumble down there then I can take the Suwantek behind it.”

He nodded, ambling over to the access hatch as the deck trembled.

“Skywalker.”

He turned back, even as the ship was rocked by more laser fire. 

“Get it down and then go. Meet up with your friends. There are moments to be a hero.” Her tone shifted to warning. “This isn't one of them.”

He flashed her a half grin. “Can’t. No hyperdrive.”

“Actually...” Jade was back at her display, and input several commands, increasing her aft shields. The Suwantek rocked as the ship continued scoring hits. “The hyperdrive is fully functional!” she yelled over several alarms, reaching to throw some switches to shut them off. “I can send you the coordinates!”

He narrowed his eyes at her. 

“I lied.” Jade didn’t look up from from the diagnostics screen. “It’s what dark siders are best at.”

Annoyed, he retorted, “Are you going to go into my head again and program me again? You’re short on time.” The deck shook as if to punctuate it.

She scowled. “No. I’m not going anywhere near your head again.” She switched topics before he could ask what prompted the decision and faced him with a look that could melt durasteel “I don't need to. This is not your fight to run away from. In three days Darth Sidious will have his second Death Star ready to crush your Rebellion. Get Ship down to the planet and go. I’ll mop up. It’s my mess anyway.”

“It wa--” A deafening blast and a savage shake almost threw him down. The high pitched blare of alarms filled the cockpit again. Through the viewport he could see debris and a smaller sphere, a kind of projectile that had ripped through the side of the Suwantek.

“Go!” she all but snarled. “Now!” 

\--

The bay doors were open and he went through a quick calming technique as the sensor display came on with the diagnostics. 

The Headhunter was not his X-wing, but neither was it your average starfighter. Having been preoccupied with continuing his training, he hadn’t noticed before, but now he whistled appreciatively as he briefly scanned through its optimizations for speed and maneuverability. He still wished Artoo was there and would feel much more comfortable with the X-wing’s quad lasers, but he was reasonably confident he could give whatever that was a run for its credits. 

“Headhunter, you’re clear,” Jade’s voice crackled over Luke’s comm unit after a second of static. “You saw how it moves. Don’t underestimate it.”

He lifted off the docking bay, angling away, the black of space stretching out beyond his cockpit canopy. His thrusters kicked on and he hit the throttle shooting off from the Suwantek. A good thing too because something skittered by too quickly to catch a full visual and there was an air of malevolence it left --

“That thing is fast!” Faster than a TIE, at any rate and more distracting. 

“It’s coming around again,” Jade’s voice rang out. “Portside.” 

A prickle from his danger sense, and he threw shield power forward, jerking the Headhunter into an evasive roll, plasma washing over where he’d been. The ship whirled back and only pushing the Headhunter into a stomach sinking nose dive made him avoid the next volley of fire. It disappeared entirely from his sights.

“I told you not to underestimate it! It’s angling for another pass.”

If it was that loaded with dark side energy, he should be able to just sense it. Luke opened himself to the Force and shunt energy to the aft shields in time for the ship to begin pummeling him from behind with laser fire. He had never missed Artoo more, the droid’s subtle adjustments would give him the right amount of edge. 

Well, he still had his instincts and the Force. 

Luke reached into his opponent’s mind to see where they would take the ship and found a wall. He blinked. He could see what Jade meant -- the ship had its own strange form of sentience...and it was wrapped around its pilot.

He got the feeling the occupant wasn’t piloting at all.

That didn't seem to matter as the ship darted past him, forcing Luke to throw the Headhunter into an inverted loop to catch up. The ship jinked too quickly for him to get a lock on it, but as it angled beside the Suwantek he thought, it wasn’t just him. 

“It’s coming up beside you,” he commed. 

“I see it,” was her terse reply.

The ship swooped away as the Suwantek's laser cannons started firing. On automatic they probably wouldn’t get the precision to hit it, but Luke wasn’t hoping for a hit. He quickly calculated its trajectory, rerouting his energy to the engines. The boost flung him forward to catch up with it, but the ship swung to starboard in the blink of an eye, trying to get behind the Headhunter. 

Pushing his speed like this meant his aft shields were negligible. Luke couldn’t let it get a clear shot. He cut his throttle back suddenly, the crash webbing wrenching him back. He could almost hear Artoo’s screeching. 

The sphere careened forward into the Suwantek’s laser cannons. It missed much of the barrage, as it snap rolled, but not all of it. Luke felt its flicker of pain, different from that of a living organism, but unmistakable. 

He automatically punched the throttle forward. The ship’s speed was cut somewhat after the hits. Luke shifted to proton torpedoes as he tried to anticipate its movements. 

More laser fire from the Suwantek forced the sphere closer to Mirnic, the white glow of it coming up. 

Luke took a breath, thumb over the trigger, a flicker from the Force and he hit the button, quickly switching to laser fire. The ship twisted quickly to starboard and the Headhunter twisted with it, lasers blasting. The ship tried to juke left while twisting right, but the track of the torpedo limited its possible movements. It didn’t get far. 

The ship reduced its speed, probably estimating the torpedo would overshoot it. It was right, the planet’s gravity pulled the torpedo off track and it detonated several klicks from it. This would have meant nothing if the ship’s speed had been what it was, but its damage, coupled with its deceleration meant the it collided with the debris and shrapnel the torpedo left behind, and momentarily reeling from the crash, it plunged into the atmosphere.

“Not bad,” Jade’s voice sounded grudgingly impressed. “You have the coordinates already. Go be a hero.”

The coordinates began scrolling through his primary monitor. The Headhunter’s nav computer automatically began the calculations. It wasn’t that distant of a jump.

Disquiet curled within him, intensifying as the Suwantek shifted its course and began its descent.

His friends. Three days, Jade had said. Even if she were lying, he was needed elsewhere. If he left, at least he’d be away from that horrible dark side miasma, that morass of rage and despair that saturated her presence.

She’d _killed_ him.

The nav computer pinged.

“You’re getting too close to the gravity well,” Jade’s voice crackled through. “Pull up.”

Luke thought of her looking out at the homesteads across the windswept canyons, begging those aliens to protect her, to heal her, only to be rebuffed and remain hopelessly alone. Had it been otherwise for her, ever? This would just be another confrontation she'd face by herself. If she did, he didn't doubt how it would end.

It didn't have to be that way.

“Pull up, Skywalker.” A note of alarm bled through her voice. “You won’t be able to make the jump.”

Luke let go of the hyperdrive lever and angled the Headhunter after the sphere. Bringing up the planet readings, Mirnic was an ordinary terrestrial planet, breathable atmosphere, highly mountainous, arid to semi arid climate.

A few bright flickers from his sensor board drew his eye. Six ships incoming, standard imperial patrol vessels from the looks of it. Planetary security most likely.

Luke keyed the comm as he pulled up beside the Suwantek. “I might be useful.”

“Don’t confuse useful with suicidal,” she snapped. “I don’t need any help.”

“Too bad.” He grinned, imagining her scowl. “You’re getting some.”

“Unidentified starfighter.” Static flooded the speaker as the comm unit switched frequencies automatically. “This is Mirnic Orbital Control.”

He flipped back into the private frequency. “See you planetside, Jade.” 

“Skywaker! You can’t--”

Luke kicked up the throttle, and broke hard to port, putting distance between him and the freighter as he descended. The patrol ships twisted to follow, leaving only one on the Suwantek. It might bang up the freighter a bit, but nothing critical.

The frequency changed again. “Transmit your identification code and state your business. Unidentified starfighter. You are infringing upon our space. Change course immediately or we will be forced to open fire. You are not authoriz--” 

Luke switched off the comm. He could still see the evil ship in the distance, slipping below cloud cover.

A trickle of warning in his awareness and he was breaking into a port roll as the patrol ships began opening fire, diving into the clouds.

The cockpit was awash by light when he emerged from underneath a thin layer of clouds. Below him enormous canyons and mountain formations sprinkled the landscape, patches of brownish-green broke up the reddish hues of the enormous stone formations scattered about, extending skyward like outstretched fingers. Vague shadows of skyscrapers jutted out towards the sky in the horizon, just as tall. 

Luke couldn’t admire the view for long. The ship had decelerated, leveling out, and the patrol ships still kept their blasting in hot pursuit. Luke redirected all his shields aft and made his evasive maneuvers tighter, grimacing as hits slammed against the Headhunter’s hull. Diagnostics blinked furiously, but nothing went red. He calculated the trajectory of the shots the patrol ships were taking, and sent the Headhunter into a sharp dive. 

The patrol ships’ lasers pounded at the evil ship and then it was falling into a dense mountain range. Most of the patrol ships save two fell back.

Luke fell behind the ships that tore forward, following the smoking enemy ship as it wove around craggy peaks, ducking into the canyons. It had to make a mistake --

It did with a boulder that bulged out, just the most minute scrape. Rock and debris went flying, some of it hitting an unfortunate patrol ship and transforming it into a ball of flame that bounced against the sides of the canyon. A warning from the Force and he narrowly missed a large flaming piece of it that hurtled by, almost hitting the patrol ship that had slid into his path. Luke veered away at the last minute, hauling back hard on the stick to pull up, a wide plateau stretching in front of him, overlooking the city he'd seen.

The evil ship itself seemed to have had a similar idea. It finally gained enough altitude to emerge in front, scraping against the plateau. It rolled, sending a thick cloud of dirt in the air and stopped at its edge, far enough to resemble one of his training remotes.

Luke brought the Headhunter down, one of the patrol ships touching down beside him several meters in front. He felt rest of the patrols several klicks away, the vibrations of their repulsorlifts thundering behind them.

He unstrapped himself and hit the controls to open the canopy, stretching with his senses towards the ship. He still couldn’t get a sense of its occupant. Whatever trial the landing had been, the ship’s Force presence was still intact. He focused on it. Immediately, an icy shiver went down his spine.

That was all he got before a voice called out. “You! Get down here.”

Luke saw two uniformed officers train their blasters on him. Several more were touching down maybe thirty to forty feet away.

Luke raised his hands, standing slowly. “I just needed to put her down for a while. My readings were off, I needed to check it out.”

“Sure." The first officer replied. "That’s why you were _chasing_ that thing, hotshot.”

He gave them his best Solo shrug.

“Get down -- “ the officer broke off once he jumped clean down, landing in a crouch. Luke kept his hands up.

“I don’t have a blaster on me,” he said.

The second officer pointed to the lightsaber at his belt. “What’s that?”

“Special use hydrospanner.”

They looked at him, but after a moment the first officer drew his blaster away.

“Alright. Sinas get his identifications.” He faced the evil ship in the distance. “Seems like we got a shy one over here. Weirdest thing I've seen.” The roar of repulsorlifts intensified, the rest of the patrol ships touching down several yards away.

“Wait,” Luke called out to the first officer before the second could approach. He dashed towards him, meaning to pull him back. “I wouldn't get near that thing.”

The officer paused and looked at him over his shoulder. “Why?”

He thought fast. “It's malfunctioning, could explode any second--”

The officer laughed. “It would have blown up by now."

A flicker in the Force was all the warning Luke had. In less than a second he had his lightsaber thumbed on, catching the evil ship's lasers on his blade, the impact tossing him back. He rolled to a standing position, senses alert. The officers were on the ground, the second behind him, the one walking to the ship off to the side, both unharmed.

_I see you Jedi._

Luke’s eyes widened. The thing hadn’t spoken and yet, he’d heard it just as if it had. He could feel it pulsating with hostile intent.

“What are you?” he whispered. Frowning, he added, “Who are you hiding?”

The evil ship reacted angrily. It did not _hide_ its occupant. It _served_ its master. With that thought Luke felt a ripple in the Force, as if a shroud had been lifted away. He still felt the ship's malicious presence, but there was someone behind it. A darker presence.

It had to be this Lumiya person. What was she waiting for?

As if she or the ship had decided his question was enough, the entryway lowered.

The first officer had stood and was whirling to level his blaster at Luke. “Hydrospanner, huh? Nice and slow there. Lower your weapon.”

Luke clenched his jaw, flicking his eyes away from Lumiya for an instant. “You don’t want me to do that.”

The patrol officer's posture eased up fractionally. “I don’t want you to do that.”

From the distance, laughter rang out as she approached.

“You want to get as far away from here as possible.”

“I want to get as far from here as possible.” The officer started backing away.

“What's going on?” the second officer barked at his colleague. He jogged towards Luke. “Lower your weapon. Rost!” He called out to the retreating officer, but then shaking his head, he advanced quickly to Lumiya, pointing his blaster. “You there, you’ll be detained for shooting--”

"Watch--" Luke couldn't finish his warning. She moved too quickly too follow, her hand was at her waist, then it wasn’t. The hilt of a lightsaber in her hands, an unfurling coil with an accompanying crackling hiss. Off the corner of his eye, Luke saw black tendrils interwoven with a bright twine of energy sweep out. 

A resounding crack ripped through Luke's shouted warning followed by a scream that cut to deafening silence. What was left of the body splattered across the ground with a sickening sound. He had been right, that thing was horrible, but it was not completely like a lightsaber. It had energy beams, but it also had what looked like leather and metallic tassels, and it dawned on him that he hadn’t noticed it before because she’d had it wrapped around her waist like a belt. 

The figure pulled its hood back and let its cloak fall to reveal a gray flightsuit. She wore headgear that covered the lower half of her face, leaving only her eyes visible. Her forehead was nearly all swaddled by wound cloth, it gave her face a weird triangular shape.

Horrified shouts rose up and Luke threw himself to the side, loathe to draw his attention away from Lumiya as the officers behind him began shooting. 

“Ship, perimeter,” she ordered. 

The ship rose up behind her, and Luke ducking for cover as it rained down fire at the mass of officers and patrol ships making the plateau tremble.

“Luke Skywalker!” Lumiya called from among the strident sounds of the firefight. “You don’t remember me?”

He stood and shifted to a defensive position with his lightsaber. “Call it off!”

Her tone dripped with amusement. “Ship? But spectators are so tiresome! And besides it’s nearly done!”

His heart sank. He’d felt several death agonies, but there was something else and he felt the evil ship move further away. What was it doing? Better Lumiya talk than attack at any rate. “I’m supposed to remember who you are?” he shouted. 

“Shira Brie,” she said as if that explained everything.

He looked at her blankly.

“Haven base?”

Luke paused, then shook his head slowly.

“You shot me down.”

He winced. “Sorry. I’ve shot a lot of people down.”

Fury came into her voice. “I was part of your squadron!”

How in space had _that_ happened? He was beginning to suspect that the streams Jade had talked about were less stable than she'd implied -- maybe no more than a Force vision, because he had no memory of this strange woman or her alias at all. Luke couldn’t give any of it too much thought because, instead of running away as the evil ship took off, the remaining officers started shooting in his direction again. He was forced to split his attention between Lumiya and the blaster bolts heading his way. 

“That Luke Skywalker is dead!” he cried out, caught off guard by the officers' single minded focus on him as a target. 

It was _her_. Lumiya was somehow channeling the officers terror and rage to him. "So he is." Several bolts got too close and she waved a hand easily deflecting them to the side. “Where is Jade?”

“On her way.” Bolts whizzed by, he got two on his blade, and sidestepped to miss another, keeping alert for any threatening move from her. “Skylane traffic.”

A loud explosion above made him whirl and duck towards the nearest patrol ship, debris pouring down from above. At least it meant the officers had opted for cover over shooting. The whip cracked and Luke was tumbling away on instinct, dirt and smoke obscuring his vision, the drum of repulsorlifts and laser cannons loud overhead. 

“You don’t need to do this!” he shouted from behind the starfighter.

“Oh, I know!” she yelled back and he felt rather than saw her advance. His heart sank. Death and destruction.

Actually, he couldn’t see much of anything, but he opened himself to the Force. She swung again and he narrowly missed the whip by throwing himself back. The tassels made a metallic screech as they clawed at the patrol ship's nose, leaving several deep gouges behind.

He had no idea how to get close enough to disarm her, not with that whip. 

The roar above became even louder, deafening, until he realized that it was because something was approaching. The knowledge reached him in a split second before a violent earthquake shook the entire plateau, and went on sending a wall of dirt and debris up. Just before he ducked for cover he recognized the massive shadow of the Suwantek at a distance, submerged in flames, explosions cracking loud as thunder, more debris strewn about as it crashed into the patrol ships at the far end of plateau. He couldn’t feel Jade, but he’d never been able to feel her in the Force unless her shielding gave. That didn’t mean much.

Luke coughed at the acrid smoke in the air, a glare in his vision and the accompanying trickle of warning sent him rolling away half a second before the whip cracked. Another crack. Too close -- he felt the sting when the strands of energy passed close enough to graze his arm.

He tried to spin away, but the heavy smoke and material on the ground made it difficult to see, he stumbled on something and found himself on his back. It was a metal rod from the wreckage about as long as his arm and he palmed it, rolling as the whip swung out to the spot he’d landed on.

Two blades, he thought of Jade’s own magenta ones. The rod wasn’t ideal, but it didn’t need to be as long as he could get under Lumiya’s guard.

He could see her in shadow, that triangular headress was as conspicuous as anything. The whip swung towards him, but this time instead of trying to avoid it, he met it head on with his blade on a downward swing, cutting through some of the metallic tassels. Predictably, the beam curled around the blade and he angled the tip of it so the whip could wrap more. He pulled it up while pushing his left foot out, sliding towards Lumiya. He yanked her forward through the curl of the whip around his blade, using that momentum, as well as his own to stab the metallic pole hard just above her knee, meeting resistance that wasn’t flesh and bone -- it wasn’t until a last ditch call on the Force that he could finish jamming it in. Hopefully, a disabling blow.

Not quite. Lumiya had already deactivated the whip and brought the pommel of the handle up, slamming it against his jaw. He rolled away in that direction, half his face throbbing from the blow, just as her foot came down hard -- and made a dent on the stone below. He sprang back up, shocked. He hadn’t felt her call on the Force. It was the dent on stone and the fact that she was still standing with a metal rod stuck clean through her leg with no trace of visible discomfort that made him think this Lumiya person had to be enhanced somehow. Prosthetically most likely.

He had no time to dwell on it. The whip sparked as she swung her arm, he blocked the strands of energy that dashed out high, then at his middle. The second attack wasn’t as fast, the coils not as erratic. After blocking several more strikes, he knew it was because even if the metal rod wasn’t outright stopping her, it was interfering with her movement. 

That gave him an opening, and Luke swung into the offensive. Sinking into the Force, he could almost weave around the x shapes she was making, but none of it would do him any good if he couldn’t actually get it off her hands. One snap of the whip and he ducked bringing his blade up, almost arm’s length from her. She parried, and suddenly, the fight seemed much more even -- that was before her undamaged leg swung out in a stomp kick to his midsection and he was thrown back a considerable distance, wheezing, his lightsaber falling out of his hands, pain flaring from his ribs. 

Danger exploded into his perceptions and he rolled to avoid a sudden barrage of laser fire, catching a glimpse of a shooting officer from the corner of his eye. 

At least Lumiya was moving away, but it was of little comfort in the midst of the shower of blaster bolts heading in his direction. Unarmed, the best he could do was buy himself time. He avoided several shots trying to look vainly for his lightsaber, but couldn't find it in the wreckage.

Luke whirled, feeling a shot pass right beside his head. An officer a good ten feet away had trained his blaster on him. As he fell into a roll, a flash of magenta cut through the air, landing like a javelin at the officer’s throat, throwing him down, his anguish sparking through Luke's awareness. 

Luke tumbled again to avoid one final blaster bolt from the first officer’s direction scrambling for cover as the shooting intensified. A prickle of alarm and he caught sight of another officer, scarcely six feet away taking careful aim, cover was too far -- 

The officer let out a blood-curdling scream, as a long magenta blade emerged from his chest. 

“Where’s Lumiya?” Jade screamed, slicing the blade up through the rest of the body to deflect several shots, while raising her hand to call her shorter blade back.

He shouted back, “I don’t know,” his relief at seeing her dialed back by the abrupt brutality of the attack. 

The blaster fire shifted towards her and she danced between the bolts, the magenta blades waving like thread through the air, sparks exploding when they came into contact with the plasma. 

She threw herself into several spins in his general direction, continuing to fend off the shots. “Get behind me!”

“My lightsaber--”

“Won’t help you if you’re dead!” He felt her draw on the Force as she wove around the laser fire, he had a split second to tumble behind her, instinctively adjusting his shielding against the press of dark side energy, winding tight around her.

He couldn’t even get a “no!” out before she released it, a deep boom reverberating through the plateau along with a jolt that would have thrown him to the ground if he weren’t there already.

His head was throbbing and he shook it to clear it. Jade was still standing in front of him. He could feel her scanning for Lumiya. With the same flash of awareness he realized all the officers that had been on the plateau were dead. All at once. He'd never really wanted to know what a disturbance in the Force felt like.

“I told you to leave, hero,” Jade snapped at him and he noticed for the first time that she was favoring her right leg slightly. His stomach clenched at the confirmation. Wound one and the other would be wounded too. He’d been careless. The whole situation seemed to be spiraling out of hand.

He stood. "You didn't have to kill them all. Not like that."

“What would your rather I do?" she retorted. "Invite them for dinner? I have a bigger problem.”

“You could find another way.”

“I don’t have time to discuss hypotheticals.”

“Not a hypothetical, these are _beings_.” His jaw tightened as he thought of the city beyond the plateau. If Lumiya could do the same, innocent bystanders could suffer immeasurably in the crossfire. “Don’t let the fight spill into the city.”

Jade cocked her head. “You think you can dictate to me?” She didn’t move, but it felt like an invisible hand shoved him until he was sprawling on his back. He fought against the hold, but there was no give. “We wouldn’t even be having this conversation, if you’d gone like I told you to.” 

“No one is forcing you to do these things anymore!” he yelled. The hold gave and he levered back up. “The Emperor’s voice is not in your head anymore! You can choose.” 

“He’s right,” Lumiya’s voice broke in. She emerged from behind some wreckage and Luke noticed the rod shaped hole in her leg. “Why so eager to shoot me out of the sky, Jade? I told you, I just wanted to talk.”

Luke’s head snapped in Jade’s direction. _She'd_ started this? 

“I know what your type of talking looks like,” Jade sneered, igniting her blades. She angled herself subtly in front of Luke.

“I even brought you Ship as a peace offering.” Lumiya sighed dramatically. “All that trouble to go get him so he can limp out of here.”

She’d barely uttered the statement when Jade advanced. Lumiya didn’t have enough time to fully extend her whip.

“Peace offering?" Jade barked out with a laugh, swinging her short blade. "I’ve never had a reason to trust anything that’s come out of your mouth!” Lumiya blocked with the handle of her whip, the impact shoving her back, her feet sliding on the dirt. She narrowly missed being cleaved when Jade slashed down her standard length lightsaber, managing to skitter away at the last second.

“Be sensible,” Lumiya cried out. “You linked us. Killing me will kill you!”

“Then make it worth it!” Jade swung in a wide arc, Lumiya dodged it without attacking. 

“Jade,” Luke shouted. It didn’t have to be that way! "Stop!”

“What do you want?” Lumiya again countered her short blade with her whip handle.

“I want,” Jade snapped her arm, bringing down the long blade and Lumiya once more missed it by a hairsbreadth. “You and...” Jade whirled into a high kick to Lumiya’s side that she blocked with visible difficulty. “Everyone like you.” She jabbed her blade and Lumiya parried with her whip handle, leaning back to miss the swipe of her long blade by inches. The last was a rage-filled scream as Lumiya somersaulted away a considerable distance. “Dead!"

“Come on, Dark Lady,” Jade mocked, gyrating the blades. “At least make this fun for me.”

That was it. Luke stepped in front of her. “Stop.”

“What the hell are you doing?” She Force shoved him aside -- or tried to, his concentration held for once. He needed to _make her see_.

Jade narrowed her eyes, but he felt her ease up on her pull of the Force. “She’s a Sith, she’s more likely to tear you to pieces than thank you for your fool heroics. You saw what she does!”

“She’s not trying to kill you.” He snuck a look at Lumiya a good twenty feet away, near the edge of the plateau. “Or me. Not now. We could all walk out of here.”

“Don’t be naive,” Jade hissed at him.

“Jade,” Lumiya called out and Luke felt her guard immediately go up. “You’ve picked this...boy as your ally? Is that it?”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Jade yelled back. 

“Why the overprotectiveness? I mean him no harm. I was just playing with him.”

He saw Jade’s hands tighten on her blades. "I know what that looks like too," she muttered under her breath.

“If you like keeping what you killed--”

Luke was suddenly weightless and airborne before he realized Jade had flung him off and and was barging towards Lumiya at full speed.

The impact of his back with the ground knocked the wind out of him, but he rolled to his stomach and reached out with his hand. The standard length blade was pulled from Jade's grasp to his, but that didn’t make a dent, since she’d opted for a throw of her shorter blade. Lumiya was ready and flicked her whip tossing it aside. Jade jumped high, calling it to her before it landed on the ground. Lumiya darted back, avoiding a nasty swipe at her head. She recovered, slamming her whip handle at Jade’s neck, leaping back clumsily as Jade lunged with another stab. Lumiya was losing ground, approaching the edge of the plateau, obviously unused to cautious defense. One mistake and either Jade would run her through or she'd fall to her death down the chasm below. 

And then Jade would die too.

Jade kicked at the side of Lumiya’s wounded leg and she fell to one knee. Jade brought her blade down with pained grimace as if she'd felt the blow, but Lumiya’s hand shot out to close around her wrist, twisting. He could feel Jade drawing on the Force to push her arm forward, the tip of her blade scraping against Lumiya’s shoulder. Lumiya screamed and Jade’s focus seemed to give for a split second, the pain almost a surprise, enough for Lumiya to Force shove her away. 

For a tense second, Luke saw Jade skid dangerously close to the edge.

She had to stop. He wouldn't reach her in time if he ran to her now. Luke was not at all certain he could hold her for any period of time either, but Jade was _not stopping_. It was his only option. He reached out with his free hand to immobilize her with the Force. 

Sensing his interference, she shot him a venomous look. What he hadn’t anticipated was the crack of Lumiya’s whip. He released his hold on Jade just as she overcompensated drawing from the Force to jump away -- realizing too late that Luke’s hold wasn’t keeping her in place anymore as she leaped away, and that there was no ground below her. A surprised widening of her eyes, then she was gone.

He screamed her name, dimly hearing Lumiya doing the same, scrambling towards the edge, Jade's blade still in his hand. It couldn’t be…

Lumiya's voice was laden with disbelief. “What did you do --” 

A warning from the Force and he jerked away, but Lumiya was faster, swooping behind him and swinging the deactivated whip by the coils to get the handle horizontally in a bruising chokehold around his throat. 

“You're...still alive,” he wheezed, pushing against her hold with the Force. "Why...attack?"

“We take oaths, Jedi.” Her hold strengthened. "They mean something." 

Luke gritted his teeth. He was not going to die in some nowhere planet, light years away from his friends, at the hands of some Sith who didn't even belong here. Summoning all his urgency, he pushed back against her hold, enough to squat and turn, striking at her the side of her face with the pommel of Jade's deactivated blade. The hold gave and he drew on the Force to snap kick her away. If Jade was gone, he thought with a pang of hurt at the futility of it all, then Lumiya didn't have long. At least there was that.

The rumble of repulsorlifts broke through the air in the distance. He looked up and those were definitely military craft. If they were spooked enough to bring a baradium missile, it would be all over. He looked around at the wreckage and scattered bodies. They could be spooked enough, he wouldn’t blame them. Luke scanned for the Headhunter. It was looking a bit worse for wear, but at least it was still in one piece. For now. He noticed his lightsaber beside some of the debris and called it back to himself, turning back to stare out to where the military vessels were approaching.

The crackle of the whip and the sizzle of its energy strand drew his attention. Luke turned igniting Jade's blade and his own with a roil of his stomach. Was Jade somewhere down the chasm, suffering? But _Lumiya_ didn't look worse for wear.

Something spherical caught his eye behind Lumiya and she turned to look. He thought it was the evil ship as first, but it lacked those odd wings. Reaching through the Force it didn’t feel like sphere. He knew that Force signature, but it couldn’t be --

All he could see was a what looked like a blueish bubble ascending to the lip of the plateau as the smell of ozone hit his nose. Whorls of electricity danced across the bubble, making Jade only a dark form within, perched at the edge of the cliff. Above them clouds twisted and darkened across the sky. It took him a moment to realize they were following the pattern on the sphere.

All around him he felt the Force thrum with dark side energy winding tighter and tighter. Luke's skin prickled at the sudden charge in the air. 

With a massive roar, the lightning storm unfurled from the epicenter where Jade’s form was cradled at the edge of the plateau, lifting and twisting across the darkened sky. Tendrils reached out striking the craft again and again. There were too many. In a concentrated burst one flare of lightning lit up a smaller craft with enough violence to fling it against the side of one of the mountains, the the blast bright in the dark.

In equal parts, astonishment and dread, Luke could feel Jade struggling with trapping so much of the Force. Even as short as it'd been his training had been clear. The Force was something that flowed through, not something to capture and twist. Not for destruction.

In the distance, Lumiya screamed as her knees buckled. Dark side energy flooded the whole of the plateau, making him dizzy and nauseous. He shut the blades and drew from the Force to strengthen his shielding. With growing horror, he realized this was not an attack on Lumiya. The Sith was _adding_ to it, balancing it so that the assault could intensify and continue.

“No,” he whispered. 

The surge of lightning momentarily blinded him, thick and phosphorescent against the dark of the clouds, streaming across the sky, striking the military craft again and again until the sky was lit up by their explosions, like fireworks streaking above. The lightning storm continued raging, thick columns slamming into the ground below the plateau drawing ever closer to the city below. Once it did, it'd rip it apart.

What could he do against something like this? Against two of them happy to burn themselves out on their own hate?

Luke closed his eyes reaching across the near endless void of hate, it was cloying, revolting, but he pushed on towards Jade's presence. This was not who she was. He knew. He'd felt it.

 _Don’t let it spill into the city. You're not like them. You can choose still._ It was a feeling. A plea. _You can choose._

For a second he feared he hadn't reached her, that the hate was too deep. Then the lightning began to thin out, skies slowly lightening. He could see Jade now, not just the dark outline of her. Her shoulders slumped forward as if she were about to fall at any second, electricity skittering up and down her body. Luke ran to her as she swayed on her feet before catching herself. 

Jade waved him away as Luke reached to help her up. "Don't touch me." His fingertips brushed her, a faint sizzle, and he instinctively pulled them away, feeling the sting from the residual charge.

"He's wrong," Lumiya gasped from where she teetered. “You've already chosen. What did you come here for if not to rid us of our chains? Why risk his anger hiding from his call? Why spend your years seeking holocrons and dusty datachips if not for vengeance?”

“To be done with it." There was strain in Jade's voice. "I’m opting out.”

“There is no opting out.”

“Yes, there is." Jade flashed her a look full of scorn. "Only you stand in my way.”

“I don't stand in your way." Lumiya let go and took one step forward in Jade's direction. "I stand _with_ you.” She gestured to the clearing skies. "This is how it could be. Your power and my power. One of us can't do it alone."

Beside him, he sensed Jade tense, alert to any sudden move.

Lumiya continued, “He lied to you. He made a fool out of you. Out of us. I _know_. Power is the only thing Sidious values. There'd be no larger cruelty than taking it from him. No better revenge." 

“Don’t,” Luke began. Don't listen--” His voice died in his throat. It wasn't a choke, Lumiya was just putting enough pressure for him not to speak.

“You need a strong, ruthless ally, not a simpering would-be-Jedi. Let him live if you like. I won't hurt him until he comes for us."

Luke tried again, “Jade--” Just as before his voice died into a wheeze. The captivated expression Jade wore was sending a shiver down his spine. He could feel the seductive pull Lumiya's words had on her. He closed his eyes, letting the Force flow, guiding it to the pressure at his throat.

"I was forged in the same fire you were, Jade," Lumiya continued. "My feelings are your feelings. My rage is your rage."

A gleefully expectant look came to her eyes. “We can make Sidious writhe like a worm on a hook. You and I, Jade! Let the Hands that strangle him be his own. You know it as well as I do." Her voice became reverent as if she were reciting an invocation. "Power gives us victory. Victory sets us _free_.”

The corruption in the words was all the opening he needed. 

"That's not freedom!" Luke drew the Force to him, breaking Lumiya's grip. “It's all a lie! Everything is a lie! It's the same thing! Just more death and destruction. It's the same --”

He felt Jade come back to herself. "I won’t trade his chains for yours.” 

The gleeful expression dissolved from Lumiya's eyes. “Then your death will be meaningless.”

“Our deaths.” 

“No. Mine will have meaning once I finish what you began." Her voice turned icy as her eyes fell on Luke. "I don't know what you want with him, but it makes no difference. If you want him to live, then know _that's_ why he'll die.” With a yell, she swung the whip and he parried high with his blade, Jade reaching out to call her own from his hands.

Lumiya's next strike was at his feet and he spun, meeting the whip’s snap. Jade advanced, but Lumiya stretched a hand and Jade was thrown to the side. She hit the smoking rubble of a patrol ship, the impact enough to dislodge a big piece of the plasteel. She screamed as it landed on her leg. 

"Jade!" he shouted, alarmed at the pain wracked cry. Lumiya also fell with a pained screech. He'd been parrying a strike and her change in movement meant the blade plunged right into her forehead.

He let go of the blade, and rushed towards Jade in desperation. She was convulsing and he threw himself down beside her, placing a hand on her forehead, diving headlong into the morass of rage and despair that defined her Force signature. He didn't even know what he was searching for, a strained thread. He didn’t think of it just _pulled_ and trapped the thread as tightly as he could. After she'd lived through the last attack -- it couldn't end like this, he thought fevered. It shouldn’t. It couldn’t. _Everything_ could be different now.

He patted Jade’s face gently. “Jade, Jade, Jade."

“No use.” Her eyes fluttered open. She smiled or tried to, it looked more like a grimace. “Your linking...needs work.”

His laugh came out as a thin, dissonant sound. “You didn’t teach me anything.”

She didn’t try to smile, but her eyes had a brief spark of humor before they went dull with pain. “Good,” she whispered. "Everything I know is poison." 

Maybe then, he thought. He felt her pain, physical and not, like a crushing wave. She was right, the connection between them was a fragile thing, he couldn't do much against it. "It can be different now," he whispered back. But if she could just reach out and take what he was offering... 

She didn't seem to listen. "Promise me." Jade closed her eyes. He felt her push back the pain. "You'll kill him."

The Emperor. His heart wrenched, more for denying a last request, than being unable to grant it. He couldn't lie to her. “I can’t promise you that.”

Her face contorted and her anguish tore deeper into him. “No hope. Happens again.”

“No. There’s always good." Luke swallowed. "Always light. Somewhere.” 

“You don’t know." Her voice was faint. "I hope… you don’t.”

He couldn’t let her go with that thought. There had to be...something…

It came to him in a flash. “Leia Organa.” He brought his palm against Jade’s scarred cheek, trying to draw her back. 

There was a twitch in Jade's emotions, recognition and puzzlement, a sense of why the general of an ever dwindling fleet...Confusion briefly sharpened her gaze. 

Joy coursed through him because he knew. Leia was alive. Not the same, never that, but alive. It meant hope. “Not everything is lost. You never looked to the future did you?”

“No future,” Jade mumbled.

“Leia's my twin.” Luke smiled at the strangeness of her being the first person he'd told. “There's bound to be others like her. Like me. Even in a stream like yours.”

He felt as understanding dawned gradually, unfolding from the truth she felt in his words, even as the thread continued its slow fade. There was light in the knowledge, too, even with how glassy her eyes had gotten, he felt its push against the dark. "There's always a future, Jade."

Luke felt, too, that their paths were linked in some way. He couldn’t let this happen to her again. “Jade's not your real name, is it?" He reached to clasp her hand, tugging on the thread. _Don't go yet_. "Tell me your name.” 

The words were no more than a soft sigh. “You know...too much."

Without the overpowering darkness, he could see a vague outline...fragmented images as if from broken glass. Jade's brilliant green eyes, a slender outstretched arm, red gold hair pulled back into a top knot over the elegant curve of her neck-- 

“That redhead at Jabba’s sail barge." Obvious and incredible at the same time, because she had been so _close_. "The one who took my lightsaber. That was you. That is you.”

He thought she might have shaken her head if she'd had the energy for it. “Not me.”

“You can’t lie.” He didn’t even know why she would try. The images remained in pieces, but had attained a stunning clarity. 

Luke pulled harder on the thread, his hold on it increasingly precarious. He thought of her forlorn and alone. He couldn’t let it happen again. He wouldn't. “I’ll find her. I promise. I’ll find a way to save you.”

Jade was utterly still, but her presence still glimmered. Her voice had turned into a soft caress in his mind. 

_It's all right. I was never meant to be the one you saved._

But there was nothing more important than her believing he would. He couldn’t hold on to her, but he could pour into her his strength of will, the only comfort he could offer. “I’ll find her.”

Warning came into it, and sadness. _Don't._

Luke tugged on the gossamer thin thread. _He never gave you a reason to believe you could choose._ He thought desperately. _I will._

She could have that certainty. He looked down at her, seeing her with his mind’s eye, light casting off shadows to reveal the woman at Jabba’s sail barge -- Jade's eyes in her unscarred face, framed by her red hair. It would be different for her this time. “I promise.”

He held the image of her like a treasure, bright in his mind. It felt like staring into a cloudless sky that stretched as far as the eye could see. It felt like forever. _That's you._

Jade drew in a breath, opening her eyes. 

Her thoughts were awash with awe, and from his tenuous hold on the thread, Luke intuited she was seeing something more. He thought he could too, but it was as out of reach as a word at the tip of his tongue. 

_That is you_ , she echoed, gaze both seeing and not. _As far as the eye can see._ Sorrow trickled through at the fragility of it all, the unstoppable nature of the flow. Ghosts of what could have been. _That was you._

She lifted a hand to his temple and he covered it with his, countering all her sorrow with his resolve.

“I’ll find her.” 

_No._ Her voice in his mind was overlaid with as much regret as gratitude as the image began to fade along with the thread. In the end it left only a vague echo of protective feeling mingled with tenderness, like stardust its wake. _You...won’t._

Until there was nothing.

\--

The main docking bay of the Rebel Star Cruiser was packed to the brim, but Luke still caught sight of the stolen Imperial Shuttle where he'd been told his friends would be. Chewie was just in front of it overseeing the loading of weapons and supplies along with the rest of the strike team. 

The _Millennium Falcon_ was stationed in front of the shuttle. Lando and Han stood in animated conversation in front of it, and while Luke was still too far to hear what Han was saying he could sense the gist from his friend’s protective feeling.

“--next thing you’ll have me putting down a security deposit,” Lando was saying with a smile.

“See you soon, pal,” Han called out, turning to the shuttle and caught sight of Luke. 

“Took you long enough!” He clapped him hard on the back, the relief pouring off him. Luke felt slightly uneasy having worried him and everyone else, but returning to see Yoda was what he’d had to do. “What was this serious business anyway?”

“Just something I had to--” The words were no longer out of his mouth than a familiar growl and a shouted “Luke!” drew his attention, half a second before he was submerged in Wookie hair, Leia’s arms coming around him in an equally tight hold.

“Easy there,” Han crowed. “Don't choke the kid.”

Leia flashed him a sullen look.

Chewie fixed Luke with a glare and growled something vaguely scolding.

Leia added her own reproach. “We wondered what held you up.”

Luke reached to squeeze her arm. My sister, he thought. Sometimes, there were more gains than loses. No matter how bleak things looked. He offered Chewie a chagrined look too. “I’m sorry.”

Leia’s expression softened. “What is it, Luke?” 

“It’s nothing.” He sighed. How to even begin? “Ask me again later.”

She still looked distinctly uneasy, but joined him as they walked up the ramp. “It wouldn’t have anything to do with the weird reports coming out of the Seswenna sector, would it?”

They walked into the cockpit and he went to check on the navigation panel while Leia took a seat, Threepio behind her. They’d told him he’d have to fine tune it for a manual input.

“Seswenna sector?” he echoed absentmindedly as he fiddled with the controls.

Chewie walked in, growling as he took the co-pilot’s chair.

“Imperials are saying Luke Skywalker damn near wiped out Mirnic’s planetary security.” Han walked in with a grin. "And don't get me wrong, that stunt at Jabba's wasn't shabby, but all of planet sec?" 

Luke’s head snapped in his direction. “They’re saying I did _what_?”

"Don't worry about it. Just stories. I expect now that Jabba's gone they'll get even more overblown." Han had turned to Chewie, taking the pilot’s seat and scanning the controls. Chewie let out another annoyed growl to which Han replied, “Yeah, yeah, I don’t think the Empire designed it with a Wookie in mind.”

“I don’t even know where Mirnic is,” Luke muttered, disturbed, taking the seat next to Leia. “Jabba’s goons still have my X-wing -- I was left scrambling for a ship. I'm glad you guys managed to get Artoo at least. You should see the hunk of junk I ended up flying here with.” He stopped himself before broaching Dagobah. Not yet. 

“Well, it's not the first time the Empire has tried to use propaganda against us.” Leia shook her head disgustedly. 

Luke caught her eye and nodded. “We’re all set back here,” she announced. Luke caught himself and smiled. He’d never noticed they did that before.

In front of them, Han seemed to freeze as he looked through the viewport, worry gathering in him.

Leia patted his shoulder, his concern drawing out her own. “Hey, you awake up there?”

“I just got a funny feeling," Han reflected. "Like I’m not going to see her again.”

Luke followed Han's eyes to the _Falcon_ through the shuttle's viewport. He understood the gloomy feeling. He'd come to a resolution after Dagobah, and had made his peace with it, but it still had the power to unsettle him. By all counts he shouldn't be here with his friends, risking them as well as their mission, but neither could he leave without saying good bye, without helping them in whatever small way he could. The right moment to face his destiny would reveal itself. 

Leia squeezed Han's shoulder. “Come on, Captain." Her voice cut through the gloom. “Let’s move.”


	4. Epilogue

**9 ABY**

“Finally awake, are you?” 

Mara saw him flinch, obviously startled, just before he turned in her direction. The all-knowing all powerful Jedi, Luke Skywalker probably wasn’t used to not sensing presences. She savored the reaction, a smile coming over her face.

The wait over his sleeping form had been worth it just for this moment. It felt like a new beginning, the moment where she would tie her loose ends, be back on course. In a way, when her new life would truly start. She would have never thought that she could feel like this, that her future could be anchored in the unconscious flightsuited man who she'd found purely by coincidence. She'd never believed much in destiny.

Maybe it was time to start.

“That’s right," she said thinly from where she sat. "Welcome back to the world of mere mortals.”

Skywalker's eyes landed on the blaster on her lap, then raised up to her face with an incredulous expression. It was everything she could have hoped for.

“Don’t like it, do you? It’s not easy to suddenly lose everything that once made you special, is it?” she couldn't help blurting out.

He shifted his look away from her to the bed. He moved slowly, sliding his legs from the bed to the ground, and gradually sitting up. They'd kept him sedated for several days. No doubt he was probably confused about that too. From the visible effort even those tentative movements seemed to take, his head had probably not fully cleared yet. 

Unbidden, the memories of waking up at the Imperial Med Center all those years ago surfaced in her mind. Her head had been foggy too then, but that hadn't stopped her from breaking the medic's nose, tearing off her IV drip, and tossing down the biomonitors to stumble out in the chaos. She hadn't even known why she had to, only knew her world was over, she was completely alone, and all she could do was run.

One lifetime wouldn't be enough to pay him back for that.

Mara dropped her hand on top of her blaster, bringing her focus more fully on Skywalker. She hoped he would spring on her. His calm in spite of it all was beginning to grate.

“If the purpose of all this activity is to impress me with your remarkable powers of recuperation," she needled. "You don’t need to bother.”

“Nothing so devious.” His voice was sleep roughened, but gave no sign of irritation. “The purpose of all this activity is to get me back on my feet.” When he turned to her again, the incredulity had faded. His gaze was even, blue eyes too clear and serene for the burn just behind her sternum that had been blazing unabated since she'd happened on his X-wing.

She met his eyes dead on. And if he was thinking he’d get her off balance, he was wrong. She’d been waiting for this for too long. 

“Don’t tell me -- let me guess. You’re Mara Jade.” Then he stopped and blinked. Maybe he remembered her from before after all. Her eyes narrowed. Well, she wouldn’t fail this time -- no blasted hero was going to sweep him away from under her nose here. “Mara Jade,” he repeated, as if testing the name.

“I heard you the first time,” she snapped. Skywalker didn't intimidate her. She _knew_ he didn't have his Jedi powers. "I'm not impressed. Karrde told me he'd mentioned my name to you."

He studied her, gaze different from before. He couldn’t be seeing anything at all and yet, he was still scrutinizing her with the kind of intensity that could unnerve her -- if she let it.

She didn’t let anything unnerve her.

So she sneered, “Take a holo. It lasts longer.”

Incredibly, Luke Skywalker, hero of the Rebellion and last living Jedi, blushed. He leaned back on the bed slightly, looking away, but his eyes kept flickering back to her, until he seemed to give up and stared intently at her again. 

“So you’re the one who found me,” he murmured after a moment.

“Yes,” Mara lifted her chin. “I am.”

* * *

 

[You be the moon/ I'll be the earth/ And when we burst / Start over ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftkJNilA4Ao)


End file.
